A local apartment investor has greatly expanded its holdings in the South Shore neighborhood, paying $22 million for two properties close to the Obama Presidential Center, according to CoStar and county property records.
New City Property Management bought Shorewind Apartments, a 16-story building at 7000 S. South Shore Drive on the lakefront, along with a smaller building one block west at 6951 S. Oglesby Ave., from San Francisco-based Belveron Partners.
The two buildings together have 250 units, according to a spokesperson for Belveron, which declined to comment further on the sale. .
The price tag is significantly more than the $16.8 million Belveron, one of the nation’s largest owners of affordable housing, paid for the 1920s-era buildings in 2019. The boost worries some community members who say the $830 million presidential center, rising in Woodlawn’s Jackson Park just to the north and set to open in 2025, could raise local housing costs beyond the reach of many residents.
“The buyer is going to want a return on their investment, and the only way I see you can make a profit is to increase the rent,” said community organizer Dixon Romero.
NCPM became one of the neighborhood’s largest landlords last year when it paid $14 million for 7100 S. South Shore Drive, a 10-story, 162-unit building one block south. Company officials did not immediately return a message seeking comment.
In 2020, Chicago City Council passed the Woodlawn Housing Preservation Ordinance, a measure pushed by a coalition of community organizations, which requires all rental and for-sale housing developed on city-owned lots in that neighborhood to reserve a portion for very low-income residents and funded several programs to rehabilitate existing affordable housing.
Romero, founder and executive director of Not Me We, a housing advocacy group, said South Shore needs a similar community benefits agreement to create and preserve affordable housing, and prevent the displacement of existing residents.
“South Shore is the number one eviction neighborhood in the city, and it’s been that way since 2010,” he said.
The neighborhood had an eviction rate of 8.7% in 2019, three times higher than the citywide rate, according to the South Shore Housing Data Project, a 2022 report from the South Shore Chamber of Commerce and other groups. And 30% of residents live at or below the poverty line, with 57.6% considered housing cost-burdened, meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on housing.
Almost 90% of voters in South Shore precincts near the Obama center favored a community benefits agreement, according to a nonbinding referendum on the Feb. 28 mayoral and City Council election ballot, Romero said.
“The Obama center is like a huge object dropped into a body of water, it’s causing these waves of speculation, but it doesn’t have to cause displacement. It can be a real honor for the president and an inspiration to the community, but we have to be here to enjoy it.”
