Workforce housing in Lee County Florida just took a significant step forward, and the numbers behind this latest project are worth understanding if you care about the long-term health of Southwest Florida’s real estate market.
Last month, ground broke on Wave at Colonial, the newest development from Naples-based Onda Housing Group. The project will bring 358 units to market, backed by $112 million in financing. That money was assembled from a remarkably diverse mix of public and private sources. By the developer’s own account, it took two years and countless late nights to pull together.
What makes this project different
Onda Housing Group is not a newcomer to this space. The company has quietly built nearly $400 million in affordable housing construction across Lee County alone. Close to 1,000 new units are currently in the works. Wave at Colonial is the latest addition to that pipeline. At this scale, it deserves a closer look at how it came together financially.
The funding stack is a case study in how large-scale affordable housing actually gets built in Florida today. Twenty million dollars came from Lee County’s disaster recovery funds. Federal tax credit equity contributed another $39 million. Citi provided both a $42 million permanent loan and a $69 million construction loan. Sixty-two million in state bonds rounded out the financing.
Each of those sources comes with its own requirements, timelines, and stakeholders. Coordinating them all into a single workable deal is genuinely difficult. That is part of why projects like this take as long as they do.
Who this housing is for
Rents at Wave at Colonial will run approximately $500 to $600 per month. That is well below market rate for Lee County, and it is intentional. The project targets households earning 60% or less of the area median income. That translates to roughly $55,500 annually.
This is not housing for people on the margins of the economy. It is housing for the people who are already central to it. The nurses, the teachers, the restaurant workers, the tradespeople, the hospital staff. These are the people who keep Southwest Florida running every day. And they have increasingly found themselves unable to afford to live near where they work.
That gap between income and housing cost has been widening in Lee County for years. Projects that directly address it, at this scale, are meaningfully different from the incremental supply that typically comes to market.
Why this matters for the broader real estate market
There is a version of this story where workforce housing Lee County Florida investment sounds like a separate issue from the mainstream real estate market, something relevant only to buyers and renters in a specific income bracket. That framing misses what is actually happening here.
When nurses, teachers, restaurant workers, and tradespeople can afford to live in the community they serve, the local economy gets more stable. Businesses can hire. Workers stop leaving. Businesses can hire and retain workers without losing them to more affordable markets. The service infrastructure that makes a place livable and attractive holds together.
That kind of economic foundation supports property values across every price point, not just the affordable ones. A market that prices out its essential workers eventually struggles to sustain the very growth that pushed prices up.
Fort Myers and the broader Lee County market have been growing fast. The question for any fast-growing market is always whether that growth has enough foundation to last. Workforce housing Lee County Florida projects like Wave at Colonial are part of what answers that question.
A $400 million pipeline of affordable and workforce housing in Lee County is not a footnote to the local real estate story. It is part of the story itself. It reflects a serious investment in the community infrastructure that makes a real estate market genuinely resilient over time.
If you are watching the Southwest Florida market as a buyer, seller, or investor, this is the kind of development worth paying attention to. Communities that house their workforce tend to be the ones that hold their value when conditions get difficult.
Have questions about what is happening in the Lee County market and what it means for your real estate decisions? Reach out and let’s talk.