SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Finding affordable housing for low-income seniors on a fixed income is hard enough, but for older members of the LGBTQIA+ community, it can be even harder. Some face stigma and discrimination just for being who they are.
This Pride Month, ABC10 is catching up with an affordable housing community geared specifically to LGBTQIA+ seniors. It’s called Lavender Courtyard and it opened a year ago.
Cory – who asked ABC10 only use his first name – and his pup Liberty moved into the brand new Lavender Courtyard at 16th and F Streets in Sacramento’s Midtown neighborhood a year ago.
“I've always felt safe around here and we're not too far away from markets and that kind of thing,” said Cory.
For the last seven years, Cory – who just turned 69 – says he's been living as his authentic self.
“I’m very, very late in life. The last seven years is when I started taking hormones… living as a man, out and about,” he said. “I mean, people look at you, like, ‘Why now?’ But, you know - in similar ways, I look at Bruce Jenner. People said ‘Why then?’ This is what happens when you're looking at your true self. You get an opportunity and now is the time… it's like a bucket list thing. Before I die, let me just be outwardly out, what I've always felt and just be comfortable doing it, you know.”
He’s especially comfortable living at Lavender Courtyard. The 53-unit affordable apartment community is designed as a welcoming space for LGBTQIA+ seniors, though anyone age 62 and older is able to apply.
“Previous housing was low-cost, but it was with a mixed age group. So we had a lot of younger people and that could be a problem when they're mixed in with the senior community. Particularly, we had some people with very severe mental health issues or very severe addiction issues,” said Cory. “So this was a senior issue, more or less, not just LGBTQ, but we had people that were assaulted or robbed. You know, it's a little bit scary, so [Lavender Courtyard] comes along, where it's for seniors… so it works out perfectly, I think.”
He pays $588 a month for an apartment he says is much bigger than his previous place in Sacramento.
Tejal Shah is vice president of community development with Mutual Housing California, which operates Lavender Courtyard, along with about 20 other affordable housing communities throughout Sacramento and Yolo counties.
“Typically, our housing is for people who are below 60% of the area median income. Most of our residents, though, fall under 30% of the area median income. For single person, I think it's like $23,000 a year. For a family of four, $32,000 a year,” she told ABC10. “We have about 3,500 people who live in our housing right now.”
But Lavender Courtyard is the first and only one designed specifically for LGBTQIA+ seniors.
“Even the residents who have come into our housing have told stories of having to live in their cars or not being able to identify themselves as their true gender or their true identity - and then when they do, just being ostracized,” she said. “We see that happening more and more as people get older…There’s ageism… it's harder to find work and to find and maintain affordable housing.”
ABC10 has covered Lavender Courtyard since Sacramento city councilmembers approved it back in 2016. Then, it was just an empty lot.
Explaining its importance in an ABC10 story in 2021, Pam Miller, the executive director of Agency on Aging \ Area 4, said “when LGBT folks need to go into assisted living and senior housing, that same sex-couples and transgender people are really discriminated against, and so a lot of times they go back into the closet, even if they have been out of the closet most of their life.”
Lavender Courtyard offers a mix of affordable housing units and permanent supportive housing units specifically for folks transitioning out of homelessness.
“Being able to provide all these services that help build community, it's life-changing for so many people,” said Shah.
Cory encourages anyone wanting to come live at Lavender Courtyard to join the waiting list.
“I know they take applications to get on the waiting list and sometimes you think, ‘Well, I’ll never get it.’ Well, I thought that too. When this place was first announced — I mean, I was hot on the wire to get in here. I just wanted to be here so, so bad,” he said. “Put in the application. It’ll go faster sometimes than you would realize or would think.”
For more information on Lavender Courtyard and how to get on the waiting list, click HERE.
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