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We are proud to play a role in the preservation of affordable senior housing in our community as we partner with Tredway on these 12 properties. Providence will continue to oversee property management operations with a primary focus on connecting our residents with the services and resource to help them thrive!

Full Nola.com article below:

Archdiocese of New Orleans sells Christopher Homes apartments to Tredway for $152 million

The Archdiocese of New Orleans has finalized the sale of Christopher Homes, its portfolio of apartments for low-income seniors, to New York-based Tredway, one of the largest affordable housing developers in the country.

The $152 million deal, which closed Friday, ensures that some 1,600 elderly and disabled residents of the 14 complexes will be able to stay in the homes, which Tredway CEO Will Blodgett said will get long overdue renovations totaling as much as $50 million.

“I am happy to say we are not only buying these and preserving them as affordable, but we are going to ensure they remain affordable and high quality for people who live there,” Blodgett said by phone Sunday.

The deal was a linchpin of the bankruptcy settlement the archdiocese reached late last year with hundreds of survivors of clergy sex abuse. Under the terms of the agreement, the archdiocese guaranteed that proceeds from the sale — after it pays off a federal loan — will go into a $300 million trust to be distributed among survivors.

Archbishop James Checchio was traveling to Rome Sunday and unavailable for comment, an archdiocese spokesperson said.

But in court documents last September disclosing the purchase agreement with Tredway, attorneys for the archdiocese referred to the buyer as ” … a responsible and experienced owner that shares in our mission to provide high-quality affordable housing and has an established track record. … Their commitment to the ‘mission’ is outstanding.”

Mission driven

Tredway was founded in 2021 by Blodgett, an entrepreneur with decades of experience developing and owning quality, affordable and workforce housing. The firm currently owns more than 6,900 units, not including the Christopher Homes properties, in dozens of complexes across nine states. Its holdings include a newly renovated 1,000-unit complex in the Bronx, a 95-unit high-rise in Pittsburgh, and more than 600 units in North Carolina.

Blodgett, whose wife owns a stake in the New York Giants, has been recognized for his philanthropy and support of civic and charitable causes in New York and elsewhere around the country. He grew up in a low-income Chicago neighborhood and said his life’s passion has been to address a need he knows about from first-hand experience.

“I had three friends in public housing in Chicago,” he said. “Affordability all across America is really hard right now and one-third of renters in New Orleans are rent-burdened so the need is real.”

Blodgett said Tredway will immediately begin upgrading the buildings in its new portfolio, making improvements to resiliency, energy efficiency and life-safety features like lighting and handrails.

Once those investments are complete, the firm will begin assessing needs within individual complexes and making in-unit repairs.

The company also plans to enhance services, where needed, adding residence services coordinators in complexes that currently do not have one, picking up the tab for cable and WiFi and providing free meals.

Providence Community Housing, which has managed the complexes for the archdiocese since November 2024, will continue to run them for Tredway, Blodgett said.

“They have done a great job and we see them as our partner,” he said. “We are going to enhance what they are able to do.”

The complexes operate under a program from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development known as “Project-based” Section 8, which caps a tenant’s rent at 30% of their income. Blodgett said rents will not go up, even though the quality of life will improve for tenants.

Money in the bank

Christopher Homes was founded by the late Archbishop Phillip Hannan in 1966 and eventually grew to include 21 apartment complexes for low-income seniors in and around New Orleans. In the early 2010s, the church sold six of the complexes to Providence Community Housing, a local nonprofit that develops affordable housing.

The properties include suburban complexes like Wynnhoven I and II on the West Bank, the Apartments at Mater Dolorosa Uptown and the 10-story Christopher Inn, which towers over Frenchmen Street in the historic Faubourg Marigny.

The properties are encumbered by $70 million in HUD debt, which the archdiocese must pay off before depositing the bulk of the sale proceeds into the settlement, which is also is funded by the archdiocese, its affiliated parishes and charitable organizations, and contributions from church insurers.

Since finalizing the bankruptcy settlement in December, nearly half the settlement funds have been deposited into the trust, with more money still on the way, court documents show.

Payments have not yet gone out to survivors, however, because a claims administrator — a lawyer appointed by the court with the consent of abuse survivors — is evaluating the claims and ascribing points to each, which will determine how much money the survivor is entitled to receive.

It is unclear how long that process will take but attorneys involved in the case have said survivors should receive payments later this year.