Chanute — In southeast Kansas, developers, municipalities, and community leaders are working to build homes through new building techniques and tax credits.
This series is covering the ways in which southeast Kansas communities are thinking outside the box to create housing and economic development opportunities.
Southeast Kansas Inc. hosted a housing conference in early November. Attendees were welcomed by Mayor Jacob LaRue.
“The connections, shared ideas, and experiences will benefit all communities presented today,” LaRue said. “Many of our communities are facing similar challenges: aging populations, aging infrastructure, and general sour attitudes. Quality housing for all walks of life and circumstances is the driving force for population retention and hopeful growth.”
LaRue said that without housing resources, communities will decline due to falling morale, hope, and investment.
“The desire of entities and groups within their community to want to continue through their calculated risk, investment, and time is not unnoticed,” LaRue said. “There are a lot of big wins within our community, but also within other communities.”
According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, meeting basic infrastructure needs in rural areas costs more, and rural housing stock tends to be older and in need of repairs. NLIHC also reports that rural counties have fewer resources to allocate to affordable housing development.
However, with the recent increased emphasis on seeking grants and partnerships, Several communities are seeing progress both in maintaining existing homes and building new homes.
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Advanced Systems Homes has built thousands of homes since 1972. Darin Luebbering, who inherited the business from his father, presented during the conference.
Luebbering said Advanced Systems Homes makes the home-building process easier by offering contract pricing and building in a modular fashion.
Of contract pricing, Luebbering said: “When a customer walks in the door, when they leave, they know the price. The price is the price, and banks love that because there is no cost overruns and it takes the fear out of building that new home.”
Luebbering said that while many are moving away from describing homes as modular, that is what they are building.
“We think of ourselves as a factory stick-built home, But if you back me into a corner, that’s who we are. We are a modular home builder,“ Luebbering said. “They are looked at the same as a sitebuilt home through the banking industry and the insurance industry.”
According to Luebbering, the homes are built to last, with many of the components being built in their Chanute facility.
“We build 75% of the product. This allows us to work every day. We have quality controls throughout our facility, and our workforce loves to work in our building,” Luebbering said.
He noted that the speed of construction has also increased. Due to working indoors, 75% of a build can be completed before final assembly. Luebbering said this speeds up the total build time by 40%.
“We also have our own trades inhouse. We have electricians, plumbers, HVAS, roofers, framers, all under our control,” Luebbering said.
Luebbering said having this variety of tradesmen on staff ensures that the entire project is done in a timely manner. Luebbering said that staff working indoors is also allowing employees to have longer careers.
“We’ve had a framer work for us for 40 years. If you have ever met a framer that has worked for 40 years in the construction world, they are a rare animal,” Luebbering said. “This guy was working on a solid surface, his tools were right where they needed to be, and his lumber pile was always in the same spot. He had a system, and he was able to save his body through those years because of where he worked.”
Another benefit is the environmental impact, according to Luebbering. He said that there is very little waste of materials, since materials aren’t moved from job site to job site.
Currently, the business builds 20-25 homes each year, or roughly a new home goes up every two weeks. In total, these homes take 90-120 days to build from start to finish.
According to Luebbering, the City of Chanute has been working to address the housing shortage in the city for years.
In 2005, work began to create the Osa Martin subdivision, which was “a slowgo.”
“Everybody remembers those years in the housing industry. It was one or two houses here a year,” Luebbering said of 2005-2018.
The 43-home subdivision took a while to gain momentum, Luebbering noted.
Luebbering said efforts to build this subdivision were helped by the Green Living Foundation’s purchase of 10 lots. Middle Income Housing grants, and the Kansas Housing Investor Tax Credit allowed Advanced Systems Homes to purchase 14 lots, Middle Income Housing grants are awarded to cities and counties with populations of fewer than 60,000 to develop single or multi-family properties for homeownership or rentals, according to the Kansas Housing Resources Corporation.
Luebbering said they were awarded 14 tax credits for the lots and $350,000 worth of MIH funds.
“What this allowed us to offer was a $50,000 credit toward the purchase of a brand new home,” Luebbering said.
This allowed those who did not already have a down payment saved to consider purchasing a home, effectively acting as down payment assistance, Luebering said.
Once these programs were put into place, they went from selling one or two houses a year to selling 14 homes within 18 months.
“We need to be on our Kansas government officials to keep the program running, because it’s great for small-town America,” Luebbering said.
He noted that many of these new homes were purchased by existing Chanute residents, which opened up other houses, which were then sold. The other four homes were purchased by individuals moving to Chanute.
Other large-scale housing projects include a five-home project in Independence in partnership with First Step Builders and the 10-home McCartney Lane project in Neodesha.
“The last thing I want to share with you is: we have to start. This was a saying by my father, “We can’t finish until we start,” Luebbering said. “Every day, we need to be working towards housing and new home ownership in southeast Kansas. So when we start, we can finally finish.”
More stories of housing innovation will be shared in future parts of the Finding Home on the Range series.
