Developers are proposing more than 100 condos and apartments about a half mile away from the Portland jetport.
The condos are being billed as "starter homes" that are intended to fill a gap in Portland's housing inventory.
The project from GreenMars Real Estate includes 90 condos and 18 rental apartments on Congress Street in Portland's Stroudwater neighborhood.
Developers said the exact purchase prices are still being worked out, but they want the condos to be affordable to first-time homeowners who have priced out of the market with rising prices and interest rates over the last five years.
"A house that sold for $370,000 at that time with a 30-year mortgage at a 3% [interest rate] was a payment of $1,500 a month," said developer Nate Green. "Now if you take a similar house today, same square footage in 2024, what it sold for is around $985,000."
Half of the condos will be restricted to households earning 80% or 100% of the area median income, or annual incomes between roughly $69,000 and more than $127,000, depending on the household size.
Eighteen of the condos will also have an attached accessory dwelling unit. Developer Chris Marshall said the construction of the ADUs is possible due to a relatively new Maine law and Portland zoning rules.
"People have been looking for a way to lower their cost of living, they'll pay a little bit more for a condo," he said. "But they get to live in a good condo with amenities in the building and then have that supplementary income if they choose to rent it out. Or with multi-generational [families], obviously there are more incomes or more net worth that can contribute to the cost of housing."
The developers are still meeting with neighborhood residents about the project and plan to file applications with the Portland planning board later this summer. Marshall said if all goes well, the condos would be built and ready to sell within two years.
