By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project
Volker Housing, Part 1
During one of my public notice crawls for Logan County/Sterling, there was a notice about a developer applying for a grant from the state to turn an empty parcel of land into an affordable housing development. That notice in full can be found in the first link below, but the pertinent bit is quoted here:
“Volker Housing Partners, LLC will submit an application to the Colorado Division of Housing (DOH). The purpose of this application is to request up to $2,000,000 in funding to develop 54 rental homes at 777 N 4th Street in Sterling, CO. “
A reader sent me an email and suggested that I look in on this company a little, and I agreed. If they’re pulling down $2 million, what fund is that coming from, who is this company, what other things are they doing in Colorado?
I have some answers to share, along with some resources for further study if you’re interested. I split what I found into two rough parts. Part 1 will be mostly an overview of Volker and how our government finances affordable housing. Part 2 will delve into a little more specifics on same.
Let’s start with Volker. Their website is linked second below. You’ll note that while the public notice from earlier lists their local office as being in Boulder, the company itself is nationwide. The headquarters are in Wisconsin and they have developed properties all over the country. By looking at the “Portfolio” tab and searching for affordable housing in the state of Colorado, I see three properties that they built and/or manage. There is a 60 unit building in Colorado Springs, a 50 unit building in Greeley, and a 68 unit neighborhood in Evans. Of the three, it seems the one in Evans is the only one offering detached or semi-detached housing.
If you look up “Development” under the site’s “What We Do” tab, you’ll note the following (quoting):
“Völker is your trusted partner in reshaping communities through affordable housing solutions. Based in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, our team has been partnering with communities for over 20 years.”
Listed under the “Mission” tab is the following:
“We focus on the development and long-term ownership of affordable housing communities. We build lasting relationships and partner with municipalities to ensure that we provide solutions to address their long-term goals and objectives.”
This, plus other similar language on their site pretty well lays out in broad strokes what Volker is and what they do. Using the language of an earlier newsletter (linked third below), Volker seems to be a government “camp follower.”
Quoting from that newsletter:
“I want to wrap today’s series by touching on NGO’s (non-governmental organizations) and how they are the modern equivalent of camp followers: NGO’s make their living by following behind governmental agencies providing services in exchange for benefits handed down. … NGO’s can also help forward the state’s policy goals by taking grant money to do the state’s bidding.”
I won’t say it with 100% certainty, but I do wonder whether Volker does any development outside of low-income housing where government money plays a part. They occupy the economic niche where you capture low-income tax (and philanthropic) funding to build and manage housing. As I’ve said before, money’s kind of like a source of energy for life. If there’s concentrated energy that can be capitalized upon, you’ll find an organism there. If there’s concentrated money that can be capitalized upon, you’ll find a company there, whether it’s private or government.
The State of Colorado for its part, especially post-COVID, has poured forth a lot of money for just such contractors. On top of that, you have the efforts in the current legislative session, such as those highlighted in the third post today.
Small wonder, then, that Volker is attracted here and wanting to expand their portfolio. Small wonder that they headquartered their Colorado operations in the center of Democratic power, Boulder. If you need to hobnob with the people that will hand over the money, being in physical proximity is a good way to do it.
To give a sense of the kinds and amounts of money laid out which draw NGO’s like Volker, I point you to the fourth link below. It’s the Colorado Department of Local Affairs, Division of Housing website–in particular their link titled “I Build Affordable Housing.”
This page would be the one that a local government and/or developer would use. It corrals all the various resources either would need: there are toolkits for local government officials, specialists to help officials and developers to navigate the various programs and help, and also a list of various funding opportunities available.
Screenshots 1 and 2 show the programs from the page that would relate to what a developer would seek.
The Affordable Housing Investment Fund is linked fifth below and it was an entity tracing its origins to the Feds raining down buckets of money on Colorado. This was money which had to be spent on COVID relief efforts. Somehow, this got tied up with stable housing programs, the theory being I suppose that we couldn’t have people without homes in which to shelter and/or we didn’t want people wandering trying to find housing.
Whatever the justification and rationale, the money had to be put somewhere, so policymakers put it into low-income housing and a new draw on state money was formed. This program was later continued and altered by a 2022 bill which created a revolving loan fund. This fund takes the program’s seed money, loans it out, and then uses the returns of those loans to finance other loans for low-income housing.
The other big player here is the money coming from Prop 123. Some of the money that would have normally gone to you as a TABOR refund was re-directed by voters in 2022 to help establish funds that, in part, go to help finance affordable housing. 60% of that money goes into a pot managed by the Office of Economic Development and International Trade, with the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority managing the contracts and grants made using that money. More information on Prop 123 funds and programs can be found at the 6th link below.
The Colorado Housing and Finance Authority (CHFA) will figure largely in the next post. They not only manage the Prop 123 contracts, they also manage Federal and State tax credits for developers building low-income housing. In addition to their application for $2 million to the Division of Housing, Volker has already applied for and received tax credits from CHFA.
One last thing to mention. I think it’s fair to generalize what I lay out here. That is, Volker is one of many NGO’s and others operating in the affordable housing market. Screenshot 3 shows the list of Colorado Housing and Finance Authority’s 2025 Round Two tax credit awards. They show who got Federal and/or State tax credits for building affordable housing.
Looking at the “Sponsors” of the various developments (the ones that got the state money to build) and put the names in Google, you’ll see lots of developers whose websites look like Volkers and who, by an informal survey, seem to build lots of high density housing.
Yet more companies whose business focus is taking government grants and building/managing low-income housing, often high-density, multi-unit building.
https://coloradoaccountabilityproject.substack.com/p/swampiness-in-wildlife-policy-and
https://doh.colorado.gov/i-build-affordable-housing
https://doh.colorado.gov/affordable-housing-investment-fund
https://cdola.colorado.gov/prop123
Volker Housing, Part 2
In this second part of a two part look at Volker and a tiny corner of the government-bolstered affordable housing market in Colorado, I want to look in more specific detail at the money going to Volker and some of the swampy connections between them and state money.
At the end of part 1, I mentioned how Prop 123, a measure passed by Colorado voters in 2022 which took part of your TABOR refunds and shunted it into “affordable housing” created (among other things) a pot of money which could be used to help fund low-income housing, said grants being managed by the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority (CHFA). I also outlined how CHFA is responsible for handing out Federal and State tax credits for housing. CHFA’s website is linked first below.
CHFA’s been around a while and has done a lot of work prior to Prop 123, so there’s a lot on their site. I got the following in an email from their spokesman as to what they do.
“CHFA’s mission is to strengthen Colorado by investing in affordable housing and economic development. CHFA was created by the Colorado General Assembly in 1973 to fulfill our mission, but CHFA is not a state agency and does not receive direct appropriations from either the state or federal government. CHFA raises funds for its programs and operations in the capital markets. As part of our role, CHFA serves as the allocator of state and federal Housing Tax Credits. I’ve attached a fact sheet about Housing Tax Credits for reference [I’ll have it linked and will mention it further down]. In addition, because of our mission and track record as a statewide investor, CHFA is often asked to administer programs on behalf of the state or foundations.”
What’s relevant to this post is the tax credits CHFA has given out to Volker. As such, I want to focus on the second link below, their landing page for their applicant and award reports.
READ THE FULL COMMENTARY AT COLORADO ACCOUNTABILITY PROJECT
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