Dover puts spotlight on surging apartment rent prices: 'We are seeing a ceiling'

DOVER — Local private and public sector housing leaders convened at the annual State of the City event Thursday to discuss challenges with affordability, to hear from community leaders and to look toward Dover’s future.

Panelists spoke about struggles people face searching for apartments in the rental market.

Thomas Toye IV, owner and broker of Arthur Thomas Properties in Dover, reported that in 2023, rental prices of units managed by the business increased an average of 11%. In 2022, rental prices had increased 17% year over year, he said, citing a portfolio of properties in Dover, Rochester, Somersworth, Exeter and Newmarket.

Arthur Thomas Properties looks for renters whose monthly income is about three times higher than their expected rent, he said. In the case of a renter within a two-bedroom apartment advertised at $2,200 a month, a single person looking to have the entire unit to themselves would need to make roughly $80,000 a year to afford the space, according to Toye.

“We are seeing a ceiling for affordability. After all these years of increases, we’re starting to see pushback from renters on what they can even afford, or what they’re willing to pay,” he said.

In the first quarter of this year, Toye’s company has seen a 60% tenant renewal rate across its rental units.

How Dover is looking to increase accessory dwelling unit count in the city

Thursday morning's event, presented by the Greater Dover Chamber of Commerce, also featured the city’s housing navigator, Ryan Pope, and Toni Gooch, assistant vice president and commercial relationship manager of Kennebunk Savings Bank.

The two panelists are working together in the city’s effort to promote the creation of more accessory dwelling units in Dover, a small step toward boosting the city’s housing supply.

In most residential zoning districts within Dover, residents can apply for land-use permitting to create upwards of two accessory dwelling units on their properties, though one must be deemed affordable at a fair market price.

“As the housing navigator, I'm having conversations with folks all the time in town about what solutions are available to solve our housing availability and affordability issues," Pope said. "Among those, it seems always like low-hanging fruit, are accessory dwelling units, (which are) kind of the ‘in-law’ apartments that you can tack onto your house to allow for multi-generational living for leasing out to another member of the community.”

A former mortgage lender, Pope has heard concerns about financing from Dover residents interested in adding accessory dwelling units. Pope then went “door to door from bank to bank, credit union to credit union” to share what he’d heard to propose potential solutions.

2023 story: Cottages in Dover open for tenants, offering small, affordable homes

“It was really pretty amazing to see our business community and business partners really step up in a way that will be meaningful for our (city),” Pope said.

At Kennebunk Savings Bank, Gooch designed a program: Residents can keep their first mortgage on their property and use a second-lien, 30-year term loan from Kennebunk Savings Bank with an amortization period of 30 years to build an accessory dwelling unit on their property.

The loan tops out at $250,000 and allows residents to do work on their property themselves instead of hiring a general contractor, a potential cost-saving method that’s atypical of construction loan requirements.

“This is a really unique product,” Gooch said. “It’s exciting that we can offer it and we’re so looking forward to working with Dover on this.”

“As planning staff, when you're coming at it from the government angle, you try to open the doors and try to remove as many barriers as you can to get really nice regulations, but it's not playing out in the real world,” Pope added. "That's kind of what prompted these conversations was, we have the framework, but there's still a problem. What's that problem and how do we fix it? A lot of those problems aren’t (solved with) government solutions. They’re solutions that we come up with as a community itself."

Pope said residents want to be engaged with the future of the city and find solutions to combat the lack of housing inventory and affordability together.

“I’ve lived in a lot of communities, and none of them have been on the same page like this. It feels like everyone’s pulling in the same direction,” he said.

Commercial interest rates slowly decreasing, though still high

Gooch commented on the commercial market, too, noting interest rates have decreased from in the 8% range last quarter to the 7% range to start 2024. Even though those rates are inflated compared to the past, Gooch says businesses are still moving into booming cities like Dover to bring their concepts to life.

“People are still moving forward, and I think they have the mindset of doing what they want to do, then if rates go down in two years, they'll refinance. It’s not stopping them,” she said of current rates. “But we are waiting to see it continue to go down a little bit over the course of this year.”

Gary Bannon: 'Make the world a better place'

The State of the City's keynote speaker was outgoing city recreation director Gary Bannon, who will retire this spring after 34 years in the post. Under his watch, the city completed the new 10,700-square-foot skatepark at Guppey Park last fall, built the Dover Adventure Playground at Henry Law Park in 2017, and expanded the Dover Ice Arena around the turn of the millennium.

“He sets the bar,” said Mayor Bob Carrier. “Everything you’ve ever wanted with Gary as a director, he kept that same decorum all the time. He didn’t get flustered. He figured it out. He used his staff. He’s always polite. All his presentations were right on, and what he’s done for the city of Dover is tremendous.”

Bannon pointed to the city staff, elected officials and volunteers as the reason for Dover being the fastest-growing city in New Hampshire for the last 20 years.

In 1989, Bannon, then a Jaffrey resident, applied to the open recreation director position in Dover without knowing a single person in the Garrison City. Fast forward to today, and he leaves the role with countless supporters and encourages city staff and other Dover leaders to let people flourish as themselves in their work, likening the responsibilities of the City Council, city departments and volunteer boards to that of a symphony orchestra.

“Go out there and play music,” he said. “Make the world a better place because you care.”

Eversource and Kennebunk Savings sponsored Thursday's event at 121 Broadway.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Dover NH: Apartment rent prices surpass 'ceiling on affordability'