Published on 18 Feb 2024 on App.com | Asbury Park Press via Yahoo Finance
SPRING LAKE - When Wells Fargo abandoned its branch on Third Avenue here at the beginning of 2022, it had no shortage of offers from developers eager to have property in the heart of the downtown shopping district.
The winning bidder, though, was Spring Lake itself, which bought the building a year later for $3.3 million and had a project of its own in mind: a restaurant on the ground floor and three apartments dedicated to affordable housing on top.
"We just don't have the properties where we can build (affordable housing)," said Bryan Dempsey, Spring Lake's administrator. "So when this came about, it was kind of like, you know what? That's the right thing to do. Let's do it."