New apartment complex planned in Greenwood

A new apartment complex is planned near a busy Center Grove area intersection.

Herman & Kittle Properties plans to construct a 274-unit apartment complex at 1497 W. Smith Valley Road, located between State Road 135 and Yorktown Road, about a year after plans to construct a similarly sized apartment complex on Worthsville Road failed to get city approval.

Herman & Kittle previously had proposed another apartment complex on Worthsville Road near Stop 18 Road, but they withdrew the request after the plan commission voted 8-1 against rezoning the property due to complaints from residents.

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Residents raised concerns about what the complex, which would have been limited to households making less than $42,000 a year, would do to property values, the area’s crime rate and traffic.

The apartment complex on Smith Valley Road, to be called The Gables, will also include apartments limited to residents making a certain income. But the development didn’t face the same hurdle, since the land was already zoned for multi-family use, Greenwood Planning Director Bill Peeples said.

The complex will be a collection of one- to four-bedroom apartments in 21 buildings, Herman & Kittle Properties Development Director Michael Rodriguez said.

Site plans show the apartment complex will be built in a wooded area, separated from Smith Valley Road by a row of houses. The apartments will be in the Center Grove school district.

Construction on the $35 million project is expected to begin in January and last two years, he said. The last approval Herman & Kittle needed was permission to connect to the sanitary sewer system, which they received last week from the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.

The complex will have apartments that are market rate and restricted based on tenants’ income, Rodriguez said. The apartments are receiving rental housing tax credits through the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority. The tax credits lower the amount of federal taxes a developer has to pay in exchange for the developer creating units for low-income renters.

The income restricted units would be for households making less than 60 percent of the area median income, he said. That would be $28,020 for a one-person household or $32,040 for a two person household. Of the 274 apartments, 52 units will be market rate and the remainder, or about 81 percent, will be income based, according to Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority records.

Herman & Kittle has other apartment complexes in Greenwood, including Copper Chase at Stones Crossing, Beacon Pointe and The Cottages at Sheek Road. Both Beacon Pointe and The Cottages at Sheek Road received rental housing tax credits. Copper Chase at Stones Crossing did not, according to state records.

The demand for rental housing in Greenwood is high right now, which is why the developers were willing to invest in this large of a project, Rodriguez said.

“Between the school system, economic environment, parks and recreation and shopping, Greenwood has proven to be a great community to live and work in, which is why we are always met with high demand,” he said. “We anticipate this trend continuing for The Gables, which is why we are comfortable with such a large investment in the community.”