Apple launches new fund to help housing crisis in native state

Apple collaborates with several companies to help relieve California's housing crisis, and Apple now has done some work of its own by making a $2.5 billion commitment to help solve its native state's housing price problem by making affordable housing available, which includes the new Bay Area Housing Innovation Fund (with $50 million in it to start and Sobrato Philanthropies, Destination: Home and the San Francisco Housing Accelerator Fund as partners for it) for its home region of the San Francisco Bay Area. Here's some facts about California's housing crisis. First, 40% of homeowners and more than a half of renters spend ~1/3 of that income pie chart just on housing, and people in both categories spend a bigger percentage of their income on housing than the national average (which is more drastic for homeowners). Next, a staggeringly small 8.4% of homes in San Mateo and San Francisco Counties (both in the San Francisco Bay Area) are affordable to people getting the median income in the two counties (unfortunately the more populated coast has the highest prices), and numerous towns and cities (including my own) in the state have a median house price of $1 million or more. Next, in all major populated regions of California, a significant percentage of people want to move out of California, especially in greater Los Angeles and among young adults or black people. Public opinion reflects this, with 26% of people thinking homelessness or housing prices is California's biggest problem as of September 2019, 68% of people in the state thinking that affordable housing is a big problem, and 63% of people in the state thinking the same about homelessness.

The fund will support a total of 4 affordable housing projects in the greater region (including the entirety of Sonoma, Santa Clara, Napa and Solano Counties) and help create 400 affordable housing units (the latter within the next couple years) in addition to Apple's current efforts (which have already helped 60,000+ people get a home, 35,000+ people in the San Francisco Bay Area avoid eviction, 2,500+ 1st-time buyers get a home, and 10,000+ affordable homes get preserved or built in 90+ affordable housing developments. It aims to clear the road of barriers often faced by developers of affordable homes and help build homes with much less cost and time involved than the average. The fund will begin its first affordable housing project (consisting of 145 permanent senior homes) with Mercy Housing in the Mission District of San Francisco as soon as next week, with the second one (located in Santa Cruz) starting later in the year. With the new addition of the Bay Area Housing Innovation Fund, Apple has now invested $1.6 billion in total to help fix California's housing crisis.

By Leo