Related California tops out 105-unit affordable project in DTLA

Related California and the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles have topped out the first phase of Alveare, an eight-story, 105-unit affordable housing building on a full city block at 1405 S. Broadway in Downtown Los Angeles, Urbanize LA reported.

Why it matters

Alveare is one of the clearer examples of California’s excess-land program actually delivering a structure rather than sitting in entitlement. The site became available after Governor Gavin Newsom’s Executive Order N-6-19 directed state agencies to put surplus state-owned land toward affordable housing, and Related California and HACLA were picked through a competitive state RFP to build on it. For a builder or GC watching DTLA’s affordable pipeline, the model is replicable: the land cost is removed from the pro forma entirely, which is what lets a project this size move from site award to a topped-out structure inside a few years instead of stalling in financing gaps the way many 100% affordable deals do.

The numbers

Phase I serves low- and extremely low-income families, averaging under 40% of the area median income, Urbanize LA reported. At full build-out, Alveare is planned as three standalone buildings totaling 303 units: family housing, senior housing and permanent supportive housing for people exiting homelessness, with phases sequenced around funding availability. The California Department of General Services’ own 2025 year-end accounting of the Excess Sites Program counts the project slightly differently, crediting Phase I with 103 family apartments and the overall project with “over 301 affordable homes,” confirming construction is underway without resolving the small gap against the 105-unit and 303-unit figures used in project coverage. Steinberg Hart is the architect of record.

What’s next

Urbanize LA did not report a firm move-in date for Phase I, and the developers have not announced financing or a start date for the senior and supportive-housing phases that follow. Until HACLA or Related California issues a public schedule, a lease-up date for the 105 completed units should be treated as pending, not confirmed. For developers eyeing other state-owned parcels through the same Executive Order N-6-19 pipeline in Los Angeles, Alveare’s sequencing, land donated first, one phase financed and built at a time, is the template to watch.