As you know, our community is both generous and appreciative. It’s a way of life that drew many of us in, and that ethic sustains us over the years as we move through personal and community-wide ups and downs. Over time, regardless of when we arrived and started to call the Methow “home,” we learn to engage and give ourselves to each other, and we find ourselves belonging to this place, rather than expecting it to belong to us.

As the Executive Director of the Methow Housing Trust, I end up being the conduit for a lot of feedback - much of which comes in the form of gratitude. When this feedback comes (as it often does, in passing at a local store or the post office), I often wish that I had time to list off the significant team of people and partners that make the delivery of affordable homes to local families...possible. I wish for all of the people who make it possible, to hear directly from their community, what a difference they are making.

So, in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’d like to share with you some of the mighty forces at work behind the scenes at MHT, so that when you next see one of them, you can offer thanks to them directly.

YOU, our community, have informed the direction of the Methow Housing Trust throughout our formative years. Together we are building towards a healthier housing ecosystem for our Valley that includes affordable homeownership for at least 75 local families, 22 affordable rental units through partnership, and continued widespread community action to advance more local housing solutions. Read on to see how you’ve shaped where MHT has gone thus far, and where we are headed next as YOUR community land trust.

We are a community that believes in belonging, and builds toward it. In times of adversity, we operate from an unyielding willingness to adapt, to innovate, to include and unite rather than exclude or polarize. Thank you to the 250+ households shaping the Methow’s housing future through participation in the Methow Housing Trust’s Campaign to Build Belonging. You made a statement that will have lasting impact.

Housing Trust to build 11 affordable homes in Twisp

“We have always been committed to helping with local housing, but can’t do it alone,” Konrad said. “I have been watching what the Methow Housing Trust does with their program, and have two employees that already live in MHT homes in Twisp. They are fulfilling an important community need, and we wanted to help them continue to successfully build more homes for local folks as soon as possible.”

“The Konrads have been such leaders in housing for a good long time. We are proud to have their trust and partnership on this project,” Ready said.

2021 marked a community-wide call to action to address growing disparities in access to housing in the Valley, which are felt (and heard) in new ways, and with new urgency. The sense of belonging afforded by secure housing is increasingly hard to come by, especially for year-round residents whose income is derived locally.

“This partnership has been brewing for over two years, but the events and market trends of this past year made it a clear priority,” said Housing Trust Executive Director Danica Ready in a statement. “MHT has learned, from informal conversations with our partners in affordable rental development, that a key to their grant-seeking success is being able to declare secured land for their project at the time they apply for funding. We have so much respect for the leadership and work of HAOC, so it was an obvious partnership to pursue.”

“The housing crisis we are currently facing … is not new news for us,” Nancy Nash-Mendez, Executive Director of the Housing Authority said. “The thought that through this new partnership, there will be 40- plus families having a place to call home by the end of 2023 is very exciting.”

In our North Cascades valley home, we are starting to work out a kind of pathway forward. The conversation is active. The Town of Winthrop recently signed a resolution declaring a housing crisis in recognition that “inaction will result in irreversible damage to the fabric of the community.” Clearly, housing is at the epicenter of our community’s consciousness, with the median home sale price doubling in the past five years from $270,000 in 2016, to $563,000 in 2021 (YTD), and businesses closing their doors more and more hours and days of the week due to a lack of workforce availability.

There is no time to lose if we wish to ensure that a genuine sense of belonging is still attainable to all of our community members, regardless of a person’s age, income or when they decided to make the Methow their home town.

The Methow Housing Trust is growing our staff as we prepare to scale up our work to develop and preserve more permanently affordable, quality housing for Methow Valley residents. Come join our team!

Hello! I’m Sarah and I am the Director of Outreach here at the Methow Housing Trust. I’m also a MHT homeowner. Last month I talked to many wonderful community members while tabling at grocery stores. I wanted to share some of the frequent conversations had. I imagine many of you have similar questions to those I spoke with. I’ll be posting the Table Talk Q&As over the next few days on our MHT Instagram and Facebook pages. Read on to see them all here.