Former Tri-Cities teacher finds new way to build more affordable townhouses for renters

Longtime Kennewick High business teacher and coach Steve Buckingham traded managing a classroom to managing rental homes and apartments a decade ago.

Now after 10 years, he’s taking another leap to build a $2 million townhome project on Seventh Avenue in Kennewick.

“There is a huge shortage of supply (of housing) and this is an opportunity,” he said.

Buckingham, 58, is no stranger to real estate. Even while teaching, he had a hand in the industry and his first job after graduating from Washington State University was as a construction sales rep in Hawaii.

He met his wife there, eventually moving back to Tri-Cities.

“Each decade, the growth has made (the Tri-Cities) way more desirable,” he said.

He recognized that people are moving here from all over the place — and needing someplace to live. With single, undeveloped lots nearly nonexistent inside the city limits, he decided to start in-building.

Buckingham and his business partners, Columbia Basin College instructor Aissata Sidibe and his brother, Mike Buckingham, formed AMS Properties. And last year they bought just over an acre at 3113 W. Seventh for $300,000.

Alphabet House-era homes

The previous owners drove a hard bargain for the property that had three tiny prefab houses on it — the former Alphabet House-era homes had been moved there from Richland years ago.

Homes built in Richland for Hanford workers in the 1940s were assigned a letter to correspond with its blue print. The prefabricated homes were not given letters.

The former owners lived in a roughly 900-square-foot home, and they rented the two smaller homes.

“Those houses got moved all over the place, most people don’t know that,” said Buckingham, who moved to Tri-Cities with his family when he was a teen.

Buckingham decided to play a new game of chess and move the homes again. He is selling or moving all three to different properties instead of razing them to make room for his townhouses.

“Why bulldoze a perfectly good house?” he said. “They are too valuable to bulldoze.”

In their place, Living Stone Homes general contractor Bruce Tyutyunnik will build four buildings with 15 townhomes.

The modest complex won’t have lots of amenities, but the units will measure about 1,000 square feet, with three bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms in two stories.

Some of his current tenants already are wanting to reserve some of them.

“Most of my tenants have been with me for years,” Buckingham said. “They don’t want to move because sadly it is tough to move.”

He said he owns units that still rents for $850 a month, and he wants to keep all his rentals affordable but with the cost of materials, he’s predicting the new townhouses will be closed to $1,400 a month.

He knows the new complex would be a stretch for many of his existing tenants who want to upgrade from two bedrooms to three.

“But as long as we do well — and by all indicators we will — we’ll expand,” he said.

Tight rental market

In July, Buckingham also bought a neighboring acre with a 1,500-square-foot home for $360,000. Eventually, he wants to subdivide it, sell the parcel with the home and build 10 more townhomes on remaining land.

And he has plans for another piece of nearby land where he could build another 18 townhouses.

“I’ve talked to the neighbors and there’s pros and cons to everything — but for the most part they understand,” he said.

Tri-Cities has one of the tightest housing and rental markets in the state. The vacancy rate in Tri-Cities apartments has only been about 2 percent, according to the Washington Center for Real Estate Research at University of Washington.

Renters are staying put because housing prices are so high, and there are so few on the market.

In June, there were only 206 active listings in the entire Tri-Cities market, according to the Tri-City Association of Realtors data. Of those, the median price was $385,000 and homes were only on the market for three days.

“This is all fun, yes, but the end goal is to sail off into the sunset,” he said. “Getting into rentals afforded me not to teach anymore and hopefully these will allow me to retire. I want to work on my golf game.”

This story was originally published August 21, 2021 at 12:55 PM.