By Brian White / CBS8 /September 30, 2024
Plans are underway to add 17 accessory dwelling units (ADU) behind a single-family home in Clairemont, and some neighbors are not happy about it. CBS 8 is Working for You to find out if the project is following the rules.
“17 units behind here. You got to be kidding me,” said Bill Buchwald, who lives on Almayo Avenue. “There’s no parking here. We’ve got a nice, quiet cul-de-sac.”
The 0.45-acre, single-family lot half-acre was sold for $1.4 million in October. The existing home will be remodeled and rented out, while the additional units will be added to the backyard.
“If it can happen here, it can happen anywhere,” said Bob Brindell, who lives nearby. “This is at the end of a cul-de-sac. There’s no parking as it is. Where are these people going to park?”
Construction workers have begun grading and leveling the dirt on the property. The developer SDRE has an office in Kearny Mesa.
“Everybody admits and agrees that we have a housing crisis. Nobody has a perfect solution,” said Schuyler Hoffman, an attorney representing the San Diego-based real estate investment firm.
Hoffman, who grew up in Bay Park and Point Loma, told CBS 8 each unit will be a one-bedroom, typically 500 to 800 square feet, and that parking won’t be an issue.
“Millennials and Gen Z-ers do not own cars in the typical fashion that we did twenty years ago,” said Hoffman. “They’re taking Ubers. They’re taking public transportation. They’re working from home.”
He added, “These are really attractive units, and the build quality is exceptional because we’re trying to attract a certain type of tenant, you know, somebody who is responsible, somebody who is a good neighbor.”
Behind the existing home, they’re adding nine separate structures, most of them two stories that would be separate ADUs stacked on top of each other.
SDRE is using the City of San Diego’s ADU Bonus Program. They’re allowed a bonus market-rate unit for every one they build as a restricted low-to-moderate income rental.
In addition, the property is located in a designated Transit Priority Area (TPA) because it’s within a half mile of a bus stop for public transit. In a TPA, the city does not require onsite parking and does not impose a cap on the total number of ADUs allowed, as long as the units are built to code and compliant with lot coverage requirements.
On the city’s website, it states, “Within Transit Priority Areas (TPA) one bonus ADU may be permitted in exchange for every affordable ADU and there is no limit to the total amount of ADUs.”
“There is an absolute need for these types of projects, and it’s NIMBY, right? Not in my backyard,” said Hoffman. “Everybody’s fine with affordable housing, right, as long as it’s not next door to me.”
While SDRE is following all the rules and requirements for the project at 4601 Almayo Avenue, neighbors feel it doesn’t fit the character of the community.
“It’s single-family residences when I moved here,” said Brindell. “That’s all there were, single-family residences, and now they’re putting these, they’re just dropping them in and not telling us, and just forcing it through.”
Hoffman is just lying to the public when he says that there will be plenty of parking available for the 17 units. He said the renters won’t own cars because “they’re taking Ubers, public transportation, working from home”. This is absolute nonsense. Clairemont is not a walkable area, people who live there will have cars, and parking will absolutely be a problem. Developers will lie about anything and act like they are doing the community a service, when in reality they are only doing it for 1 thing, profits.
Uber/taxi daily for the working class?
WTF?
Fire T. Gloria now, not tomorrow!
Like you’re going to screen and discriminate if you own a car? Doubt it. Then the comic lawyer throws out “Nimby”. No responsibility. Exactly why these building changes need to stop.
If Mr. Hoffman is so sure that the tenants won’t have cars then he should be in the lease, no street parking allowed except for guests. We’ll see how that works.
Also, when the developers talk about affordable housing, what buildings are they talking about. average medium income of white-collar workers not service workers. Yeah, really affordable.
Todd Gloria is a slave to his developer donors and will let them have their fees waived, make their profit and move on leaving the community to deal with the impacts of parking, water and utility.
Todd talks about considering San Diego his home for 46 years but he never bought a home. So, he is not invested in our city and has no skin in the game when it comes to land use and private property rights. They have become Todd’s rights. Let’s fire him on November 5th!! Larry Turner for Mayor!
Perhaps Mr Gloria is planning to move to Washington D. C.
Seems like an oxymoron – or just a moron. People who live in affordable housing cannot afford to uber everywhere. Nor do they work from home.
Go with moron.
This is the snake oil language of some developers:
“we’re trying to attract a certain type of tenant, you know, somebody who is responsible, somebody who is a good neighbor.”
Oh, OK then, geez, that sounds wonderful. I don’t suppose that could be included on the property deed, that you will only have tenants like this? No? I didn’t think so.
The Mayor has plans for even higher density developments in our existing neighborhoods than this example. We need new leadership- vote for Larry Turner.
I’ve dealt with Christian on this property and I believe he did his work with the dirt without permits and then is slamming more units in. He just talks about how he’s the best at it and it will be okay and the he goes back to his home with no one around.
OMG! Another developer who thinks people don’t have money for cars are SOooo delusional. Low income and super low income folks have cars, big screen TV’s, cell phones. They may have an old hoopty car, but there’s a friend or someone in the family that knows how to keep it running. These developers are being pimped out by who…. the mayor, or who? They need to stop going for the okie doke of a politician and do some research. For “affordable” housing one has to earn $110,000 per year to qualify. That’s not “affordable”, for the folks who work at minimum wage jobs and earn $20.00 pr hour, for an annual gross income of $38,400 before taxes. This whole “affordable” scam is a word game, created by the mayor and DSD.
San Diego was recently designated as one of the most expensive cities in the world. I understand the concerns about parking but the housing needs to go somewhere…..unless we expect everyone to live out in Temecula and commute to San Diego.
Outrageously overly subsidized high density studio and 1 BR apartment rentals are not bringing the cost of housing down. Please go outside, there is 20 years of proof of failure. Mindless, immoral, Party serving housing policies have made the politico-corporate real estate monopolists rich, while our taxes clean up the trail of genocide left in their path, and politicos refuse to track and properly record their deaths as a metric.
73% of our neighbors, schoolmates, co-workers, and friends continue to be callously and calculatedly legislated into homelessness are San Diegans.
RECALL TODD GLORIA
Let’s remember that Hoffman won’t ever have to worry about ADUs since his property at 2484 Pine st near Presidio park is on a hill and, other than the main residence, can’t support additional residences. This goes for his neighbors also
This developers don’t care about the community. It is just for profit. It won’t be affordable. Our city will become third world when all middle class will live on top of each other while the rich people will buy their big land surrounded by walls.
Please define the term ‘affordable housing’ as it applies to housing in San Diego. Give it a number. How much & for what?
“Affordable Units” start at $2700/month for a Studio apartment. This is how the politico-corporate landlord cartel are gouging the public to manipulate regional rents that send rents exponentially higher with the construction of dozens and dozens of unimaginative Soviet Bloc Style high density eyesores with burnt orange and olive green doors.
It always needs to be repeated:
THERE ARE NO STATE LAWS, NO COUNTY, NOR CITY LAWS THAT REQUIRE THE CONSTRUCTION OF ANY AFFORDABLE HOUSING .
The City is required by the state to ONLY ISSUE PERMITS FOR AFFORDABLE HOUSING AND IT STOPS THERE ALMOST EVERY TIME.
DEVELOPERS RARELY IF EVER HAVE BUILT AFFORDABLE UNITS AS PROMISED AND PLANNED, AND CORPORATE LANDLORDS NEVER WILL BUILD OFF-SITE CONSTRUCTION OF AFFORDABLE HOUSING EITHER! They’re not required to…