Sherwood Commons - Sunday School Presentation

Sherwood Commons Habitat for Humanity of Greater Nashville Townhome Community

Townhome Features • (23) two bedroom, 1.5 bath (1100 sq. ft.)

• New appliances including refrigerator, stove/ oven and stackable washer/dryer • Open floor plans • Two assigned parking spaces per unit • Easy transition to homeownership

Convenient Location • Zoned and charter schools within five miles • Shopping within three miles • Convenient access to interstates, Briley Parkway, downtown and Metrocenter • Close to East Nashville and other entertainment venues

Affordable Pricing

Convenient Contemporary Living Energy Efficient Modern Design Townhomes Minutes from Downtown

Habitat for Humanity of Greater Nashville is excited to offer 23 twobedroom townhomes in its newly planned community Sherwood Commons. Applications open April 15. HOA professionally managed landscaping and exterior maintenance creates an easy transition into homeownership. This convenient location offers affordable space for busy lifestyles.

The contemporary designed multi-level units feature open floor plans and two parking spaces per unit and is located north of downtown Nashville at the intersection of Ewing Drive and Gwynnwood Drive.

Built to the same award-winning quality standards of all Habitat for Humanity of Greater Nashville homes, Sherwood Commons townhomes will be 100% ENERGY STAR certified meaning lower monthly utility bills.

• Anticipated sales prices in the low $200ks • Payments starting at approximately $900/month*

* Estimates for property taxes, homeowners insurance and homeowners association dues are included but actual amounts may be higher. Assumes a $200,000 purchase price financed by Habitat or its partners with a 30 year, 0% APR loan for $200,000. Homes are sold for their market value at the time of sale and payments cannot exceed 30% of the eligible buyer’s gross income.

Applications open April 15 Next step: www.habitatnashville.org/apply or call 615-254-4663 (HOME)

Sample Floorplan Two bedroom floorplan D/W

Sherwood Commons

LIVING

11'-4" x 21'-2" 895031

KITCHEN

12'-11" x 11'-11" REF.

The new townhome community is located north of Downtown Nashville at the intersection of Ewing Drive and Gwynnwood Drive with convenient access to interstates.

BATH

6'-6" x 5'-5"

HVAC

PANTRY

WH

FIRST FLOOR PLAN

BATH

6'-4" x 11'-9"

HVAC

BEDROOM

BEDROOM

11'-5" x 10'-5"

12'-11" x 10'-5"

LAUNDRY 4'-2" x 3'-5"

SECOND FLOOR PLAN

Annual Income Qualifications* Annual Income Qualifications* Household Size

1

2

Minimum household income

$34,000

$34,000

$34,000

$34,000

Maximium household income

$46,100

$52,700

$59,300

$65,850

3

4

* All income limits and criteria are subject to change and may vary based on individual applicant situations.

Additional criteria apply and more information is available at: www.habitatnashville.org/homeownership.

Habitat for Humanity of Greater Nashville Homeownership Program Sherwood Commons homeowners will qualify for the Habitat homeownership program, attend homeownership classes and work on the build site with their sponsors to earn the opportunity of homeownership.

Applications open April 15 March 24, 2021

Next step: www.habitatnashville.org/apply or call 615-254-4663 (HOME)

He grew up in low-income housing; now he's designing townhouses for Habitat for Humanity

As a child, Darrell L. Hayes ran from gunfire in his East Nashville neighborhood; and now he's an architect building safer spaces for those growing up like he did.

Brad Schmitt Nashville Tennessean

He was a nerdy little kid who kept his head buried in the old set of encyclopedias his mom bought for their apartment.

Darrell L. Hayes, though, often shared what he learned with his sisters, one older, one younger.

“What do you think of this?” he asked one day while examining a rock he picked up off the ground in their low-income apartment complex in East Nashville.

“Uh, it’s a rock,” his older sister said dismissively.

Undeterred, the boy continued.

“Rocks,” he said in a scholarly tone, “are a foundation we can use to build on.”

His sisters busted out laughing.

There goes their dweeb brother – they called him “Mr. Professor Head” – with more weird observations about the way the world worked.

More:Nashville's Habitat for Humanity is starting to build townhouses for the first time ever More than once, the girls and their mother came home to find Hayes in front of the toaster or some other appliance he’d taken apart to try to figure out how it worked.

And Hayes rarely missed an episode of “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau,” about the French explorer’s nautical adventures.

Hayes also got his hands on a Jacques Cousteau book and copied every word into a notebook, hoping to soak it all in.

“He would always say, ‘I’m gonna be like Jacques Cousteau and explore the world,’ ” Hayes older sister, Angela Royster, said, laughing.

But this was serious business for the boy. He, his mom and his two sisters lived in a place with no carpeting, one toilet and barely enough hot water for one quick shower — and the next person had to wait 30 minutes for more hot water.

He grew up in a crime-infested area where Hayes ran from violence and gunfire dozens of times.

He grew up without a dad. And he grew up with a kind, quiet mother who battled anxiety and depression and who once intentionally shot herself with a gun.

Hayes and his sisters wanted out.

The Jacques Cousteau obsession was a fantasy that freed him, albeit for just a few minutes at a time, from a tough life, Hayes and his sisters said.

“Escapism was everything,” said Dr. Jalila Hudson, Hayes’ younger sister. “It was key.”

But it wasn’t Cousteau who delivered Hayes from anxiety and poverty.

It was the boy’s intelligence, determination, and adult mentors, including a ninth-grade math teacher who convinced the boy that he was smart and he should go to college.

Hayes, 46, took that advice and graduated from Tennessee State University. He’s now an architect and licensed contractor who lives with his physician wife and their children in a big house in a peaceful Hermitage neighborhood.

And Hayes is now creating a safe, new Habitat for Humanity townhouse complex where disadvantaged kids won’t have to grow up like he did.

A bullet smacked into their railing When he was a boy, Hayes and his sisters shared one bedroom, and one twin-sized bed, in their apartment in East Nashville’s Marina Manor Apartments. Two of them would share the bed and the third would sleep on a blanket on the bedroom floor or on the living room couch.

Hayes folded his thin pillow in half to make it seem bigger when he slept on the floor.

His mother constantly pushed her three children to finish their homework and study hard. But she often wasn’t there because she was working multiple jobs. She sometimes cried or locked herself in her room for a couple of days at a time.

“She was really stressed because of bills, trying to provide for three kids, disappointments from relationships,” Hayes said.

His mom eventually got on anti-depression meds, but, Hayes said, “We pretty much had to grow up fast.”

In the neighborhood, Hayes remembered running from a shoot out one day, with a bullet ricocheting off their apartment’s porch railing just as he rushed through the front door.

Ting!

At Maplewood High School, Hayes started thriving after his ninth-grade math teacher told the teen he was an outstanding student. After that, the teacher put Hayes on the front row so Hayes wouldn’t be distracted by classmates who didn’t pay attention.

“I didn’t know I was smart until he told me I was smart,” Hayes said, “and after that, I made straight As in math.”

A year or so later, Hayes’ mother shot herself in a suicide attempt. The three children cried together for a few days, afraid their mother wouldn’t survive, afraid they would be separated if their mom died.

Their mom survived. But Hayes always felt uneasy about his mom’s mental health after that.

“I think I couldn’t really relax until I got to college.”

A year later, Hayes was traumatized again when, hanging with friends late at night in a Krystal’s parking lot, he saw a gunman shoot and and kill a neighborhood acquaintance just a few feet away.

Still, Hayes continued to excel academically and avoided drug dealing and gang activity many of his peers fell into.

Hayes got grants and student loans and went to MTSU for a semester before transferring into TSU’s engineering/architecture program.

“I was really excited to go,” he said. “I knew there was a better future for me.”

Hayes eventually landed a job at prestigious Nashville architecture/commercial real estate firm Southeast Venture. He helped design multi-family units in Germantown, 12 South, midtown and other upscale areas of Nashville.

Hayes launched his own architecture company, Vivid1, in 2014. He opened a construction company two years later.

And his favorite project so far is designing the affordable townhouse complex Sherwood Commons in North Nashville for Habitat for Humanity.

The project is personal.

“I grew up in low-income apartments, so I understand the need for good-quality affordable housing,” he said.

“Sometimes I imagine myself with my mom looking for somewhere that’s affordable, in a safe community. It brings a little more purpose to what I’m doing. It’s more satisfying than any other projects.”

Reach Brad Schmitt at brad@tennessean.com or 615-259-8384 or on Twitter @bradschmitt.

Nashville's Habitat for Humanity is starting to build townhouses for the first time ever For 30 years, Habitat for Humanity has built single family homes for low-income families in Middle Tennessee, but that is changing as less land is available — or affordable — for purchase Brad Schmitt Nashville Tennessean

The first Habitat for Humanity townhouse community in Middle Tennessee is being built in north Nashville.

Habitat leaders said they are trying townhouses because it's getting tougher to find big tracts of affordable land in and around Davidson County.

"The wave of the future will be higher density builds," said Chip Wilson, Habitat's senior vice president of construction.

"It’s getting really difficult in the city of Nashville to find large tracts of lands to do subdivisions."

In fact, Habitat already is planning to build a second townhouse community along Murfreesboro Road in Antioch, Wilson said.

More:He grew up in low-income housing; now he's designing townhouses for Habitat for Humanity The first townhouse complex, Sherwood Commons, consist of 26 units to be built by sponsors, volunteers and future townhouse owners, much like what happens with Habitat's individual homes.

Habitat will start accepting applications next month at habitatnashville.org/apply. New townhouse owners will start moving in around January 2020, Wilson said.

What's available: ►

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23 two-bedroom units with 1.5 baths on 1,100 square feet Three three-bedroom units with 2.5 baths on 1,400 square feet Each unit comes with two assigned parking spots New appliances include refrigerator, stove/oven and stackable washer/ dryer

Requirements ►

Potential home buyers have to sign up for an information meeting before applying online

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Minimum annual income of $34,000

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Minimum of two years of "steady income"

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Maximum income of $46,100 for an individual and up to $65,850 for a family of four

Costs

► Townhouse owners will pay a minimum in the low $200,000s through a 0% 30-year mortgage. ► Monthly mortgage payments are estimated to start around $900. ► There will be a monthly a home owners association fee, but the amount has not been decided yet.

Reach Brad Schmitt at brad@tennessean.com or 615-259-8384 or on Twitter @bradschmitt.