Strategic Plan 2025 -2028
RootedHomes
RootedHomes Out Loud
We envision sustainable, equitable communities where everyone can afford to live where they work and play.
As RootedHomes enters its tenth year and we embark on our second strategic plan, we have again taken a thoughtful, community-informed approach to how we evolve towards the future. We’re doubling down on the core values that have shaped what we do (affordability, sustainability, and equitable access) while honing in on the implementation values that demonstrate how we do it (authenticity, growth-oriented, and interdependence).
We focus on Central Oregonians who have fewer avenues to homeownership and wealth-building opportunities as a result of historic and present day systemic barriers that keep them locked out. Systems of homeownership have historically and continue to exclude people based on race, ethnicity, class, sex, gender identity, disability, marital status, immigration status, geography and more. Through our workforce housing program and innovative strategies to increase access, we meet people where they are across Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson Counties.
As RootedHomes enters its tenth year and we embark on our second strategic plan, we have again taken a thoughtful, community-informed approach to how we evolve towards the future. We’re doubling down on the core values that have shaped what we do (affordability, sustainability, and equitable access) while honing in on the implementation values that demonstrate how we do it (authenticity, growth-oriented, and interdependence).
We focus on Central Oregonians who have fewer avenues to homeownership and wealth-building opportunities as a result of historic and present day systemic barriers that keep them locked out. Systems of homeownership have historically and continue to exclude people based on race, ethnicity, class, sex, gender identity, disability, marital status, immigration status, geography and more. Through our workforce housing program and innovative strategies to increase access, we meet people where they are across Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson Counties.
Developing affordable housing is a response to the reality that market rate housing is not affordable to most. “Affordability” is a spectrum, and we know that community-members don’t fit neatly into boxes around identity, income, wealth and financial circumstances. Our commitment to our priority population remains resolute as we prioritize BIPOC households with family housing needs earning less than 80% of the area median income.
Sustainability is core to what makes our homes affordable and equitable, and it’s part of our commitment towards a healthy, thriving Central Oregon community.
Our mission remains the same: to provide environmentally sustainable and affordable homeownership opportunities to those who contribute to the fabric of the Central Oregon economy and community.
Our 2025-2028 Strategic Plan brings into focus the systemic changes our efforts will impact not only in our region, but across our broader industry. Our goals are aimed at increasing our impact in alignment with our values, mission, and vision.
Sustainability is core to what makes our homes affordable and equitable, and it’s part of our commitment towards a healthy, thriving Central Oregon community.
Our mission remains the same: to provide environmentally sustainable and affordable homeownership opportunities to those who contribute to the fabric of the Central Oregon economy and community.
Our 2025-2028 Strategic Plan brings into focus the systemic changes our efforts will impact not only in our region, but across our broader industry. Our goals are aimed at increasing our impact in alignment with our values, mission, and vision.
Goal 1: Expand Affordable Housing Development
To build no less than 180 homes by 2028, with a focus on rural communities throughout Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson counties. Aspire to exceed that goal by leveraging partnerships and the inherent value of RootedHomes’ community land trust.
Workforce Housing
Our workforce housing program bridges partnerships between the public and private sector by ensuring that those driving the local economy benefit from the security of homeownership. RootedHomes will implement its housing selection preference for employees of partnering employers to ensure those who represent the fabric of our economy - including our nurses and teachers - can afford to stay in the community.
- Bolster community resiliency by integrating our workforce housing strategy with the region’s economic development plans to identify essential workers.
- Expand our workforce housing program by building at least three new partnerships with essential workers in Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson counties.
- Aspire to at least 50% of homebuyers being employees of essential workers.
Green Building
RootedHomes will continue to strive to build homes and communities to meet its net-zero energy standard. RootedHomes aims to be as green as possible in its energy efficiency, design sufficiency, site selection, materials choices, water usage, indoor air quality, long-term operations and resilience. Recognizing that RootedHomes’ mission is to provide affordable housing, RootedHomes will continue to fund these costs and not pass them onto the homeowners.
- Reduce environmental impact by delivering the highest level of net-zero energy to both its building and site design.
- Improve the sustainability footprint of our communities by measuring the carbon footprint of each community to ensure a higher standard of “green” than the previous community.
Goal 2: Increase Accessibility & Financial Support
Further serve our priority population, by reducing financial barriers to homeownership by increasing access to low-interest mortgages and down-payment assistance, while also deepening the cultural responsiveness of our resident-driven design.
Financial Barrier Reduction
In traditional homeownership programs, the less money you have, the more you have to pay. For example, when someone makes a smaller down payment, lenders often require the homebuyer to acquire Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI), which can cost hundreds of dollars on top of mortgage payments every month. RootedHomes is committed to reduce PMI for all homeowners by ensuring access to down-payment assistance, including its own forgivable loan fund.
- Reduce barriers to accessing homeownership by aiming to offer a 0% interest loan program to provide down-payment assistance based on need.
- Support more opportunities for homeownership for those with fewer financial resources by maintaining or lowering the average Area Median Income (AMI) of the homeowners we serve, which is currently 73% AMI.
Low-Interest Mortgage Lending Program
High mortgage interest rates remain a significant barrier for many families, especially those who are legally working with an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) who often have to pay even higher rates, if they can even access a mortgage lending product. In Central Oregon alone, we know that hundreds of families, primarily in the Latine community, are ready to embrace homeownership once the inequitable barriers of ITIN-lending are reduced.
- Create more opportunities for homeownership by aiming to work with our partners to pilot a 30-year fixed rate mortgage at a 3% interest rate.
- Reshape mortgage lending for those locked out of historical products by developing a roadmap for scaling low interest mortgage lending program across Oregon and beyond.
Culturally-responsive “Resident-Driven Design”
What makes a house a home is personal, and housing needs are different across the many facets and cultures of our Central Oregon community. Our ‘Resident-Driven Design’ process has always been about ensuring that homeowners have a voice in the design of their community and home. We understand that having a choice about the size of a house, its location and layout, access to parking, garage space and more are not just “nice to haves.” We aim to better meet Central Oregon’s diverse housing needs by deepening existing and cultivating new partnerships with culturally-specific organizations.
- Increase resident choice by integrating focus groups earlier in our “Resident- Driven Design” process
- Expand formal partnerships with more culturally-specific organizations.
Goal 3: Advocate for Affordable Housing & Community Resilience
To raise Central Oregon’s voice by fostering local community-building while also scaling innovation, collaboration and advocacy state-wide and nationally. Community Land Trust models are an incredible way to invest in the fabric of our community, and like anything, the more they are resourced, the more they can thrive.
Building Community Resilience
Becoming a RootedHomes homeowner is about more than security for you and your family-it’s about deepening roots in Central Oregon and strengthening ties to community. RootedHomes is committed to better investing in homeowners as the stewards of our communities, by providing tailored post-purchase support to increase civic engagement and financial resilience.
- Support homeowners to take action to lead their own stewardship program by being leaders in their HOAs and in their post-purchase work.
- Homeowners and board members become civically engaged in voicing the impact of being part of a CLT.
Coalition-building to Advance Affordable Housing
As a founding member of Partners for Affordable Housing and representing Central Oregon on board leadership for Housing Oregon and Neighborhood Partnerships, RootedHomes is leading advocacy on policy changes that impact the daily lives of Central Oregon homeowners—and homeowners like ours statewide. We are working with partner agencies to educate elected officials and connect them with the lived-experiences in Central Oregon.
- Increasing representation in both local councils and the state legislature of CLT advocates.
- Raising the voices of RootedHomes homeowners on a state-level.
Knowledge sharing
RootedHomes aims to increase the awareness of and access to our strong homeownership model beyond Central Oregon. From our equity-building Community Land Trust to our leadership in innovative programs including resident-driven design and workforce housing, RootedHomes seeks to share its knowledge base with our peers.
- Pulling a continuous thread of CLT education and compliance in partner organizations, across the state.
- Support cities, for-profits, and non-profits in small and rural communities across the Pacific Northwest to scale their permanently affordable housing strategies across the state.