Corporate law attorney in John's Island, SC.

JOHNS ISLAND, S.C. (WCIV) — Funding is now complete for a major affordable housing development on Johns Island that will bring homeownership opportunities to 50 Lowcountry families struggling with rising housing costs.

Sea Island Habitat for Humanity has secured all the funding needed to begin building infrastructure for Sweetgrass Preserve, a new neighborhood planned on a 30-acre parcel of land. The milestone clears the way for construction to begin on what officials say is the nonprofit’s largest project to date.

Once completed, Sweetgrass Preserve will include 50 affordable, owner-occupied homes for families who already live and work on Johns Island but have found it increasingly difficult to buy a home through traditional means.

“It’s folks who own their own houses. So, it’s not rentals. They’re not short-term residencies,” said John Rhoden, executive director of Sea Island Habitat for Humanity. “They’re people who already live here and now getting a house of their own for the first time. It’s people who can’t afford a house in the normal process.”

Habitat officials say the project is a direct response to rising housing costs on the island. New data shows the typical home now sells on Johns Island for about $700,000, nearly 10% higher than this time last year.

Habitat for Humanity says Sweetgrass Preserve offers what it calls a long-term housing solution. Families who qualify purchase their homes through an affordable mortgage and also help build them alongside volunteers.

“We’re probably the closest thing I can come up with to a permanent solution for housing,” Rhoden said. “They’re getting a house, it’s their house, it’s a mortgage, they own it. But they also have to work on that house. It’s not a free house — they’re buying it from us, and they help us build it.”

READ MORE | "Charleston Housing Authority approved for 77-unit affordable housing on Huger Street."

The nonprofit is currently working with Charleston County to complete the permitting process. Construction is expected to take about five years, with 10 homes built each year.

Unlike some previous Habitat projects, officials say Sweetgrass Preserve is being planned and built as a single, cohesive neighborhood. The development also includes efforts to preserve natural features, such as saving trees and creating green and park spaces within the community.

“We’re spending a lot of time up front, getting it all planned beginning to end,” Rhoden said. “So, it’s one community as opposed to just throwing a house here and there like we have done in the past sometimes.”

Building homes in the same area at the same time also allows Habitat to maximize volunteer efforts.

“We’re all on the same street working, all building at the same time,” Rhoden said. “We can use volunteers on multiple buildings at the same time. It helps with the economies of scale.”

With funding now secured, Habitat officials say there are more opportunities for community members to get involved.

“We always need the help,” Rhoden said. “We need help swinging hammers, painting, caulking — all kinds of things. If you want to come work on a job site, you can give us a call.”

Groundbreaking for Sweetgrass Preserve is expected to begin in mid-2026, and officials hope to have the first nine families moved in by next December.

JOHNS ISLAND — Trees falling onto roads are not as rare of an occurrence as residents would like.

Since last November, the St. John’s Fire District has responded to 60 calls to clear downed trees that block the roads of the Sea Islands, according to data from the fire department.

Of those 60 calls, over half of them were for various roads on Johns Island.

These downed trees aren’t always just the result of storms or bad luck. Development and lack of maintenance are often the culprits, said Ary Fun, president and co-owner of The Charleston Arborist.

When developers start construction, bulldozers and excavators come in to clear trees and end up taking out six to eight inches of soil, which 90 percent of tree roots live in, Fun said. That layer of soil also contains organic material and is replaced with fill dirt once it’s taken out, which ultimately kills the root systems, he said.

“It needs these organic materials in the soil to thrive,” Fun said. “Without it, they suffer drastically.”

Once the trees suffer from the loss of the nutrients in that top layer of soil, they stop producing the hormone that repels pests, he added. Without that hormone, insects attack the weakened trees, which only stresses them out more.

But development is only one part of the problem. Trees that stand along the sides of the roads on Johns Island are the victims of irregular maintenance, Fun said.

The state Department of Transportation's vegetation management guideline says all trees should be limbless for the first 18 feet above the paved road. But Fun said he’s seen branches under 18 feet, and trucks constantly hit them.

He suggested more regular maintenance of the trees along roads to ensure they’re following DOT’s guidelines, and assessment reports that detail the health and condition of the trees.

While many trees near roads and construction sites are under strain, conservation groups have worked to ensure that not all trees on Johns Island are at risk.

Several entities, including the Coastal Conservation League and South Carolina Environmental Law Project, worked together to protect the Angel Oak, which is considered a local landmark and has recently been nationally recognized as a community forest because it was protected from development.

Samantha Siegel, Angel Oak Preserve director at the Lowcountry Land Trust, was also part of the effort to preserve the tree and its surrounding ecosystem. She told The Post and Courier that the groups and Johns Island residents were worried about proposed developments in the area and potential impacts it would have on Angel Oak.

Siegel said they were most concerned about the loss of the surrounding grand trees that would have been cleared for development. Those trees help protect the Angel Oak from harsh wind and sunlight, and are part of the tree’s ecosystem, she said.

She added that the wetlands on site help control the water quality and prevent the Angel Oak from getting too much water, or too little. Just keeping that ecosystem intact is the best they could have done for the Angel Oak, Siegel said.

“If we can prevent any kind of disturbance for these trees, that is the best way to help them survive,” she said.

JOHNS ISLAND, S.C. (WCSC) — The Sea Islands are preparing to celebrate a major milestone in the push to expand affordable housing as leaders get ready to cut the ribbon on a new community for low to moderate income seniors.

What began as a groundbreaking in 2024 has now become a reality for dozens of longtime Johns Island residents. Demand for the 72-unit complex was immediate. The building reached full occupancy in just 35 days; many of the new tenants moved from aging apartments directly across the street.

The nearly $26 million project came together through support from over 10 funding partners, including the City of Charleston, the Charleston Housing Authority, Charleston County, the South Carolina State Housing Finance and Development Authority and the South Carolina Community Loan Fund.

Esau Jenkins Village was developed with the Sea Island Comprehensive Healthcare Corporation to provide seniors 62 and older who earn 60% or less of the area median income with safe and centrally located housing. The community includes 61 one-bedroom units and 11 two-bedroom units along with shared spaces such as a community room, fitness center, computer station, walking trail and outdoor gathering areas.

The development honors Esau Jenkins, a Johns Island leader whose work in civil rights, education and economic opportunity shaped generations of families across the Sea Islands.

For developer Ward Mungo, founder of Mungo Companies, the project’s completion represents far more than opening a new building.

“Seeing everybody that was living in the older apartments across the street, the late ‘70s buildings, they were blown away when they saw the opportunity to move into units that are on par if not better than a market rate development. That was the moment where it was like, ‘this is what I get up for every day,’” Mungo said.

He added that the effort behind affordable housing often goes unseen.

“The work has already started and I think one thing a lot of the public doesn’t see is that when shovels go in the ground, it’s like an iceberg. Only a small part is visible above the surface and everything else is below,” he said. “It takes years of planning and coordination for something like this to come together.”

He explained that the people who will benefit most from that work are the same community members that residents interact with every day.

“We’re talking about the folks you see across the Lowcountry from waiters and kitchen staff, all the way to a senior nurse tech or even the principal of a school,” he said. “Those are the populations we’re really aiming to serve.”

Mungo said building affordable housing is also deeply mission driven.

“The challenge is that it is not a get rich quick scheme. It is truly an industry and a sector of what we do that is the hearts and minds component,” Mungo said.

He said that mission is what motivates his team.

“I get to wake up and know that what I’m doing and what we as an organization and most importantly my team who has been working really hard has set out to do, we all have one unified goal when we wake up,” he said. “We know we are setting out in our day to make somebody’s life better.”

He added that rising housing costs show why this work must continue.

“It’s not even the working class anymore. We’re a metropolitan area where market rents are not attainable unless you make 150% of the area median income,” he said. “It’s a celebration of where Charleston has come but also a wakeup call for me as a developer to really tap into what is needed.”

Mungo said the future of affordable housing must look different than in previous generations.

“The goal is to incorporate multiple generations and multiple income levels, with people of different socio-economic backgrounds living together to break the trend of how housing used to be developed,” he said. “In a modern future the buildings are architecturally beautiful, people live together in harmony and when you drive by you don’t know who is living in which building because it all fits into one cohesive master plan.”

He said he hopes the project encourages other parts of the Tri-County to work together to place affordable housing near major job centers and support public transportation that grows with these communities. Mungo Companies is already moving forward with additional developments that support Mayor Cogswell’s goal of creating 3,500 affordable homes in Charleston by 2032.

Although residents moved in earlier this week, the official ribbon cutting for Esau Jenkins Village will take place Thursday as the Sea Islands celebrate a long-awaited community designed to help seniors remain in the place they have long called home.

JOHNS ISLAND, S.C. (WCSC) — Johns Island is one step closer to welcoming one of its largest affordable housing efforts in years, a project designed to give local families a real path to homeownership.

Currently, the property is marked with Keep Out signs, but that’s expected to change soon. The site could become the entrance to a new neighborhood with roughly 50 affordable homes, covering about 30 acres of land on Back Pen Road and Jimmy Mitchell Lane.

The development is being led by Sea Island Habitat for Humanity. Once Charleston County gives approval, the nonprofit says construction could begin as early as this summer, with the first nine homes on track to be finished by December 2026.

Building all the homes in one location helps the nonprofit work more efficiently, potentially shortening the wait for families hoping to own their own home. More than 100 families are on the waitlist, far exceeding the number of homes planned, but Habitat for Humanity leaders say they are moving as quickly as possible.

Prospective homeowners won’t pay the full market price. Instead, they’ll pay roughly half of what a typical home costs in this part of Johns Island, and they’ll contribute between 300 and 400 volunteer hours, including hammering, painting, and digging footers, as part of the “sweat equity” program.

“We’ve got 17 approved families right now. We’ve checked their backgrounds, credit, work history. And we’ve probably got around a hundred families on the waitlist.” Executive Director John Rhodes said. “They know it takes time, but they’re willing to wait because once it’s done, the home is theirs — on their own lot.”

The planned homes will include a mix of two and three-bedroom homes, with some one-bedroom homes possible. Rhodes says the homes are stick-built, not modular, and meet hurricane safety standards, with quality finishes inside and out.

Through these hundreds of affordable homes, Sea Island Habitat is not just building houses; they’re creating a community for families who were previously displaced, giving them a chance to build equity, stability, and a future. Volunteers note that families who earn their homes through the program often use that stability to make other life investments, like sending their kids to college.

“Families who have built up equity in their home have been able to use the equity in their home to send their kids to college,” volunteer Christopher Ibsen said.

Sea Island Habitat said if the project is approved, work could start next year, with families by the dozens hammering out a path to homeownership.

For families interested in earning a home through volunteer hours, more information is available here.