TRUCKEE, Calif. – 2025’s first Good Morning Truckee of the year had four speakers talk about their experiences with Truckee’s many different housing programs and options—some of which were success stories, while others brought up concerns in the area.

Jessica Penman, president and CEO of the Truckee Chamber of Commerce presented the four speakers: Brittany Johnson, Cori Elba, Cynthia Fang, and Aaron Nousaine. Their experiences ranged from recipients of grants and programs to landlords in the area.

Brittany Johnson was a recipient of the Truckee Home Access Program (THAP) Buyer funds, which can be used as down payment assistance, renovations, and other expenses. She has worked in the Truckee Police Department since 2020 and spoke about why she applied and the impact that THAP has had on her life. She and her husband moved from the East Bay to Incline Village in 2019, experiencing difficulty with housing when COVID-19 hit. But the THAP program helped her with putting a down payment on a house in the community.

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“I can’t tell you how much living in the community… has been invaluable to me as a town employee,” said Johnson. Though she said that the maximum home purchase price of $937,500 was limiting, she’s happy that she’s been able to settle down.

Johnson also spoke about her experience with applying, where she had to submit documents about her and her husband’s income since it’s affordable housing. After she applied, they had six months to search for a home until they needed to renew their application. She also clarified that she still had to seek out a broker and realtor. The THAP is available to those working in the Tahoe-Truckee Unified School District geographical boundaries, with an annual income that does not exceed 245% of the Area Median Income (AMI), and it places a 55-year deed restriction on the property so that it can only be bought by people eligible for the program until 55 years elapses.

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THAP is closing on its 24^th house and about 50 people have benefitted from the program. On average, they’ve contributed $110,000 per home and spent about $2.5 million since the program started. They still have money left in the fiscal year—enough to help close on more houses should people be successful in their search. It has projected funding for the next four years but likely will have more if it continues to succeed in helping with housing.

Cori Elba currently lives at the Artist Lofts in Truckee. She works as a flight attendant and moved to Truckee in 2021 while she was on furlough due to COVID-19. Though she isn’t always at her apartment, she considers herself lucky to be one of the first people living at the Lofts.

One of the major draws of the Artist Lofts is its unique leasing—it is income-restricted, and its upper limit is 80% of the AMI. It also allows creatives to make as much sound as they want before quiet hours in the evening, a fact that Elba lauded when she spoke about learning to play the drums in her new apartment.

Elba has performed in Truckee as a local artist and even wrote her most recent EP on an experience at a traffic stop she had in Truckee. Despite her packed schedule as a flight attendant, she said, “When I’m here, I do my best to really be here… and I love the support Truckee has given for artists.”

The Artist Lofts have a fairly high turnover rate compared to other apartments in the area—Elba is one of the longest-term residents there but has tried to put her creative roots down in Truckee.

However, she also told the attendees that she was struggling to continue to pay rent, as she is in an 80% AMI unit, which is now out of her price range. “I’m grateful to have housing because I know it’s a dime a dozen, but it’s still hard,” she said.

Cynthia Fang spoke next, as a recipient of the Tahoe Forest Health District’s Purchase Assistance grant. She was born in Taiwan, grew up in New York, and lived in San Francisco for 18 years, so mostly lived in big cities. She worked as an occupational therapist but didn’t feel ready to go back to San Francisco after she’d taken a break to care for her ailing father.

Instead, after she’d met someone who introduced her to the Truckee area, she decided to apply for a job as an occupational therapist at the Tahoe Forest Health District. She was accepted soon after her application, but had some difficulty with finding housing, since she noted so much of it relied on word of mouth.

Fang found that she loved where she worked, recounting that she told herself, “[Tahoe Forest Hospital] is a gem—I’ve got to figure out how to stay.” She found out about Hopkins Village, a housing development in Martis Valley that she was interested in. However, Fang wasn’t a first-time buyer, so she wasn’t able to use other programs in the area.

However, her broker told her about the purchase assistant grant, which surprised Fang, since she worked there and hadn’t heard about it. But it ultimately helped Fang to purchase a townhouse in the area, where she noted other units were available and that she hoped other prospective buyers would come be her neighbor.

Since 2023, the Tahoe Forest Health District has provided 10 loans, totaling nearly $1.6 million. The loans don’t have to be paid back until the property is sold.

Lastly, Aaron Nousaine spoke from a different perspective as someone involved in housing in the North Tahoe/Truckee area. Though he wasn’t involved with creating the Lease to Locals program, Nousaine wanted to speak about the incentives of transferring their property to long-term rentals and its place as a near-term strategy.

For the Lease to Locals program, the property must be located in the town boundary, can’t have had full-time tenants in the last 12 months. Leases can be seasonal or long-term, but rent cannot exceed $3,500. Additionally, at least 50% of the household must be locally employed for at least 20 hours a week, and the adult gross income cannot exceed 150% AMI.

Nousaine spoke about the property he is currently renting out to two tenants, which he bought with the consideration that it wasn’t a property for which other workforce households were competing. He purchased the property for $675,000 and invested $50,000 into upgrades, such as properly insulating the house.

Nousaine also noted that he purchased the property in hopes that he could secure housing for his family in the future. His aging father currently lives off the grid and Nousaine was interested in having his father move into the site or into an accessory dwelling unit on the property. He also thought about his daughter. “I’ve seen the trajectory of housing in this community… and I have concerns about [my daughter] being able to stay here if she wanted to,” he said.

The property is currently rented at $3,000, which isn’t enough to cover the expenses of the house. While Lease to Locals did help, Nousaine said, “It doesn’t fully offset our holding costs for the first year, there really is no option for additional funding moving forward.” However, Nousaine acknowledged that he is interested in providing housing to the community and that his household can absorb the net negative that the property is having.

He also fielded a few questions regarding his desire to increase different programs in the area—he described the plan to have near-term, short-term, and long-term solutions as a housing mosaic. Nousaine also urged people to pay attention to different factors, including not letting second homeownership eat into the limited market.

The next Good Morning Truckee will be on February 19 and will address upcoming projects in the area.

Eli Ramos is a reporter for Tahoe Daily Tribune. They are part of the 2024–26 cohort of California Local News Fellows through UC Berkeley.