The Pacific Scene Family of Companies has been known throughout Southern California for over three decades as a major building and development company of single-family housing, apartments, quality industrial parks, shopping centers, office buildings and resort retirement living communities. Throughout Pacific Scene’s existence, there has always been a common thread of a higher standard of quality and performance in each project.

One recent project is raising eyebrows as a benchmark for future affordable housing development standards. The Meadows in the City of Poway features 33 high performance affordable homes with amenities rarely seen in the affordable home market. Each home at The Meadows showcases a 2.3 kilowatt solar electric roof system, tankless water heaters, fully landscaped drought-tolerant front and rear yards, efficient heat and air conditioning systems, and energy star appliances.  Through the use of effective insulation, high performance windows, tight construction, and energy efficient products, each single-story home at The Meadows is an EPA rated Energy Star qualified new home that is at least 15% more energy efficient than a new home built to the 2004 International Residential Code (IRC).

Pacific Scene Homes and Legacy Building Services (Legacy) fully embraced the opportunity in 2008 to partner with the Poway Redevelopment Agency to create this 33-unit for-sale affordable housing community right in the City of Poway’s core.  Aptly named The Meadows due to its proximity overlooking a large natural open space, The Meadows complements Poway’s “City in the Country” character; a sense of place where people want to live, work, raise a family, and enjoy the natural, cultural, and recreational facilities offered in the community.  All of the 33 single-family attached and detached homes are for sale to Affordable income eligible First-time homebuyers through the Poway Redevelopment Agency’s Supporting Home Ownership in Poway (S.H.O.P.) Program.

With the affordable housing industry’s vision, core principle’s and the Poway Redevelopment Agency’s achievements as the catalyst, Pacific Scene began The Meadows planning and design process with a focus of spreading the positive perception that building quality affordable housing enhances communities. The Meadows was an opportunity to showcase a commitment to quality, sustainability, durability, and ease of maintenance, further exemplifying that building an affordable housing community doesn’t mean building ordinary housing.

“Although homeowners are most excited about the features in the home that help to provide better performance and lower ownership cost, it is equally rewarding to highlight our other desirable home features such as granite kitchen countertops, durable vinyl rear yard privacy fencing, rain harvest barrels, use of low VOC paint, CRI green label carpet and kitchen cabinets with built-in recycling bins,” says Kris Hui, The Meadows Project Manager at Pacific Scene.

 “As a family run business, we continue to be determined never to build anything that our children would not be proud of” says Jason Khoury, President of the Pacific Scene Family of Companies.  “Our goal was not only to make the dream of homeownership a reality for many deserving families, but The Meadows has allowed us to assist the City of Poway in achieving their goals of offering a complete spectrum of housing opportunities to local employees by promoting long term residency in Poway through an environmentally conscious community where owner’s are proud to live in and support each other’s quality of life.  This community continues to prove that affordability need not be a compromise.”

With that in mind, at Pacific Scene, every project is viewed from a long-term perspective.  The Family of Companies  feels a strong sense of responsibility to the present Southern California community, and to the generations that follow.

“The affordable housing community is a wonderful close-knit group of organizations.  As we have been invited to tour other affordable housing projects throughout the last few years, we recognize the industry changing strides of these partners in affordable housing and with everyone collaborating and sharing ideas; we expect to see some of The Meadows design features incorporated into other successful future developments.” states Hui.

However, developing and building an affordable, quality built, sustainable home was not enough.  With years of easy credit and rising home prices that lead to homeownership for many who simply desired it, Pacific Scene feels that much can be learned from the approach of the Poway Redevelopment Agency, and its non-profit affordable housing community partners. 

Developing an affordable housing project by a traditional market rate developer did not come without its challenges.  Assisting the Poway Redevelopment Agency in analyzing and obtaining leveraged project financing, learning the latest affordable housing laws, marketing to a limited affordable income market, and teaching prospective homebuyer’s the Agency’s S.H.O.P. program guidelines, were a few of the challenges involved in the learning curve.

“Unlike other market rate developments that Pacific Scene has completed in the past, it was extremely refreshing to learn that The Meadows qualified for leveraged financing through State programs," stated Hui, "Although we did not have much experience in writing grants or chasing funding sources, we were excited to learn and assist the City of Poway in analyzing the most appropriate financing sources to target and cheered when the project received its formal commitment.  The extra funding is so appropriate in that its program guidelines ran parallel with the Poway Redevelopment Agency’s program to assist educated qualified buyers in making their first home purchase in a one-of-a-kind community.”

With a number of families moving in to their new homes and only a handful of homes left on the market, Pacific Scene and Legacy Building Services have left its stamp.  Jason summarizes, “The Meadows is a testament to our beliefs that public-private partnership projects can be attractive, cost effective and help to improve the social, economical and environmental well-being of the community.  Market rate developers, community stakeholders and non-profit affordable housing developers should pool all of our resources to foster partnerships to enhance the economy of the cities we are in, and introduce durable environmental improvements as part of our development strategy to create cleaner, more energy efficient, safer places to live, work and play. On behalf of the Pacific Scene Family of Companies, we continue to be blessed to have the opportunity to support affordable housing.”