NORTH OLMSTED, Ohio — Roxanna Robinson and her husband have lived in their split-level house for decades, on a quiet street filled with friendly neighbors.
But when you’re aging – and your home is, too – it can be hard to keep up.
“You live in a house long enough, there are a lot of things that need done,” Robinson, 76, said of basic maintenance and big repairs. “Most people can’t afford to do it all at once, and we’ve had a lot of medical and personal issues here.”
In 2023, her husband, Jim, tripped and injured himself on the couple’s front patio. Robinson realized the cracked pavement needed to be fixed. Then, in a bit of serendipity, a postcard popped up in the mail, offering a lifeline in the form of a city home-repair program.
Robinson set aside her skepticism and applied.
Now the area outside her front door is smoothly repaved – and the house has new windows, a new back door and a new air-conditioning unit. Workers also moved the sump pump to address occasional flooding downstairs.
“You know, the timing was just incredible,” she said. “Because that patio had to be taken care of.”
North Olmsted launched a pilot home-repair program in 2022 using federal money from the American Rescue Plan Act, an economic stimulus bill designed to help communities rebuild after the pandemic.
That experiment proved how deep the need is for basic repairs, even in a suburb where the median household income surpasses $80,000 a year.
“When we opened this program, the number of people who applied to receive these funds and to be able to start the work on their homes was amazing. … We didn’t even realize, I don’t think, the impact that it would have,” Mayor Nicole Dailey Jones said.
Now, officials are making that temporary program permanent. North Olmsted’s City Council recently agreed to commit $250,000 a year to home repair loans and grants.
Leaders acknowledge that’s not a ton of money – but it’s a start, an attempt to chip away at a problem that’s vexing communities across Northeast Ohio. North Olmsted aims to build up a revolving loan fund, in a model that could be an example for other suburbs.
Dailey Jones says the city has two goals: To help elderly homeowners stay put. And to ensure that when those homeowners or their families are ready to sell, the properties don't have expensive flaws that drive buyers away.
“The last thing someone wants to do is look at buying a home that they immediately have to put a new roof on – or that they immediately have to upgrade their HVAC system or something like that,” said Dailey Jones, who wants to see properties sell to new owner-occupants instead of flippers or far-flung investors.
'Almost difficult to fathom'
It could cost more than $149 billion to address the nation's home-repair needs, according to a report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
In Northeast Ohio alone, the need is probably somewhere between $150 million and $200 million, said Justin Fleming, the vice president of single-family preservation for CHN Housing Partners. “It’s almost difficult to fathom,” he said.
The local nonprofit is running North Olmsted’s home repair program. CHN is also getting a new home-repair program off the ground in Cleveland, using a mix of public and private money.
"The housing stock is aging," Fleming said. "it's getting to that 50, 60, 70-year mark. A lot of these are 50, 60, 70-year-lifespan homes, and there's some major system repairs that are now needed.
"You also have relatively stagnant wage growth," he said. "You have a decent amount of folks on low or fixed incomes. And you have the increasing cost of labor and wages and materials for home repair. This delta between what needs to happen to the homes just to make them safe and what folks can afford is just continuing to grow."
He described North Olmsted as "a real leader" in trying to chip away at a widespread challenge.
'Life stability investments'
Homeowners in the suburb can qualify for up to $15,000 to fix or replace roofs, porches, walkways, electrical systems, plumbing and heating and air-conditioning systems.
Eligible applicants must have a household income of less than 300% of the federal poverty level. That means the income cutoff is about $45,000 for someone living alone and just over $109,000 for a family of four.
Many existing home-repair programs in the region have much lower income limits.
North Olmsted is dividing applicants into three tiers.
The lowest-income households are eligible for a forgivable loan – essentially a grant. If the applicant stays in the house for 5 years or the head of the household dies, the debt will be wiped out.
Applicants in the middle group, with higher incomes, will receive interest-free loans. They’ll have to pay the money back when they sell or refinance.
The highest-income applicants will get a 5-year loan at a below-market interest rate.
CHN Housing Partners is running the application portal and will manage the construction process.
“It’s things that make you safe in and around your house,” Fleming said. “Sometimes it’s even just getting in and out of the home. … It’s not about ‘I want a new countertop’ or ‘I wish I had a newer deck.’ This is truly about life stability investments.”
'Everybody has a money issue'
Dailey Jones said she’s thinking about today and the well-being of people who live in North Olmsted now.
But she’s also focused on the future, on the viability of her suburb’s housing stock and its ability to attract new families.
Robinson is thinking about the future, too.
She hopes to leave the family’s house to her son Joe, who is autistic and has an intellectual disability. At 52, he lives upstairs, in a home where every inch of carpet and every step is familiar.
“We love him to death,” Robinson said. “He makes us laugh. And so I want his life to be great after we’re gone.”
She has no regrets about reaching out instead of dismissing that home-repair postcard as a sham – or something too good to be true.
“I do believe some people pass on it,” she said. “They don’t want people to think they have money issues. Everybody has a money issue. Especially if you’re retired – you’re not wealthy.”
Needing help, she added, is nothing to be ashamed of.
“That’s life, and we’re all in the same boat, pretty much,” she said.
Her advice to her neighbors? “Apply.”
