CLEVELAND — The City of Cleveland is committing $18 million toward the creation of the Cleveland Housing Investment Fund (CHIF).

What You Need To Know

  • The City of Cleveland is committing $18 million toward the creation of the Cleveland Housing Investment Fund (CHIF)

  • The fund will be owned and managed by Local Initiatives Support Corporation, or LISC, a national nonprofit that connects public and private resources for underserved communities

  • LISC will use the fund for low-cost loans to developers to rehab and build affordable housing in neighborhoods that don’t typically attract investors

The fund will be owned and managed by Local Initiatives Support Corporation, or LISC, a national nonprofit that connects public and private resources for underserved communities.

Cleveland’s housing fund will be used for low-cost loans to developers to rehab and build affordable housing in neighborhoods that don’t typically attract investors.

LISC is seeking $100 million total for the fund, and Key Bank has committed $20 million.

In a finance committee meeting Monday, Council President Blaine Griffin said the body pushed to ensure this fund will work to create 100 for-sale homes so families can build wealth in historically disinvested areas.

“That was very important to council, and we know we had to do a lot of negotiation, but we think we got to where we want to be with that because some of these dollars were money that we were going to put for downpayment assistance,” Griffin said. “So in addition to that, we know we got to work with some of the other lenders in order to really try to advertise and beef up their programs.”

LISC has created similar funds in the Bay Area, Charlotte and Detroit, which so far have financed over 6,000 units of affordable housing total.