Solaira – Affordable Senior Apartments Coming to Irvine

The Orange County Register

August 10, 2014

IRVINE – Seniors looking for an affordable place to live in Irvine next summer will have an option north of the Great Park. FivePoint Communities, in a partnership with Irvine-based Related California and Riverside Charitable Corp., is building a 221-unit apartment complex for people who are at least 55 years old.

One- and two-bedroom units are expected to be rented at rates between $811 and $1,174.

The apartments, dubbed Solaira, will be in Pavilion Park alongside FivePoint’s single-family homes. It’s the first of 1,056 affordable units the developer is required to build. The City Council has given FivePoint approvals to build 9,500 homes around the perimeter of the Great Park.

At a groundbreaking ceremony Friday, FivePoint CEO Emile Haddad said it was always envisioned that grandparents could live near grandchildren in his Pavilion Park neighborhood, pointing to the community’s greenhouse as a place where two generations could meet and bond.

All the eventual 1,056 units will remain affordable forever based on agreements between the developer and the city. Haddad said he didn’t know what populations would be eligible for the remaining 835 affordable units to be built after Solaira, but he said there has been talk of potentially developing affordable housing for veterans.

Of Solaira’s apartments, 189 will be one-bedroom units and 32 will have two bedrooms. One-bedroom units will be priced between $811 and $981 and two-bedroom units will range from $936 to $1,174, according to executives with Related California.

Related California has built several thousand affordable units throughout the state, but Solaira is its first Irvine project. The project is expected to include a social services center, pool, fitness center, picnic area and bocce ball court, said Bill Witte, president of Related California.

“This is high-quality, first-rate housing,” he said. The architect is Irvine-based KTGY.