Forty new single-family homes are headed to a stretch of city-owned land along Evans Avenue in north St. Louis, funded by a $17 million package of federal tax credits and municipal loans that Habitat for Humanity St. Louis says will begin construction later this year. The homes will rise east of North Newstead Avenue in the Vandeventer neighborhood, an area that has spent decades losing population before a modest rebound in the last census count.
According to KSDK, Habitat for Humanity St. Louis secured $17 million in New Markets Tax Credits for the project, with the Enterprise Financial Community Development Entity contributing $6.7 million and the U.S. Bank Community Development Entity adding $3.3 million. The St. Louis Development Corporation kicked in $7 million in tax credits plus a separate $3.45 million loan, and the development carries another $8.8 million in leveraged financing from Midwest BankCentre. Kimberly McKinney, CEO of Habitat for Humanity St. Louis, said conversations with the St. Louis Development Corporation began early in 2025, well before last year’s deadly storm reshaped the city’s housing math.
The May 16, 2025 tornado, McKinney said, exacerbated the critical need for more affordable housing in St. Louis. That storm was no ordinary weather event: the rain-wrapped EF3 reached peak winds of 152 mph and a maximum width of 1.8 miles, killing five people and causing $1.6 billion in damage to more than 5,000 structures, according to the National Weather Service. Meteorologists rated it the widest tornado in the St. Louis region since reliable records began in 1950.
A 40th Anniversary Milestone Built in Concrete
The timing carries symbolic weight beyond the storm recovery. The 40-home build coincides with Habitat for Humanity St. Louis’s 40th anniversary in 2026, a nonprofit affiliate that has constructed or rehabilitated more than 450 homes serving over 1,700 residents in the region, according to Smith NMTC Associates, LLC. The organization has branded the effort around the slogan “40 Years. 40 Homes.”…