Marin City’s historic Golden Gate Village housing complex just opened a pathway to financing the first phase of a $266.6 million multi-year renovation.

Phase 1 is expected to begin in February 2026. It will focus on the first 88 units of the property’s 296-unit mid-century low-rise buildings. The buildings will get upgraded kitchens and bathrooms, enhanced safety features, energy-efficiency improvements and refreshed outdoor spaces. Phase 2 is planned for 2027, and the final phase could begin around 2029. Each phase will require separate financing.

On Tuesday, the nonprofit developer Burbank Housing announced that the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee approved a $3.9 million 10-year annual federal tax credit for the project, which is being built in partnership with the Marin Housing Authority.

“The tax credit is a federal credit that IRS allocates to each state and then each state has the responsibility of allocating it to projects like ours,” said Mike Andrews, development consultant with the MHA. “Then we sell the credit to an investor. So, it’s the investor that gets the reduction in their tax liability.”

In this case, the investor pays $35 million and gets a $39 million reduction in their taxes over 10 years.

“So, that’s how they get a return, and that’s how we get money to rehab our building,” Andrews said. “We’re getting a lot of phone calls. We’ll go through a process to pick one. It’s a bit of a competition. There’s a lot of investors active in the Bay Area.”

A three-phase project

Phase 1 of the renovation will cost $84.8 million. The investor will bring in $35 million. Another $33 million will be financed through tax-exempt bonds sold by the county and the final bit will come from other resources like Burbank Housing and the MHA, Andrews said.

“We imagine that by 2027, we’ll be in a spot to be ideally rolling on Phase 2,” said Andrews. “So, we’ll have to go back and seek tax credits again and repeat the process we’re doing for Phase 1 on Phase 2 and 3.”

FILE: Golden Gate Village residents look at renovation plans for the 1960s-era housing complex during a community meeting on Monday, March 10, 2025, in Marin City. The Marin Housing Authority is spearheading a $266.6 million revitalization of the property that is expected to commence in February 2026. (Marin Housing Authority via Bay City News)

Built in 1961 and designed by Frank Lloyd Wright protege Aaron Green, Golden Gate Village was created to house workers after World War II. Now listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the community includes 300 low-income families.

“We’ve been living in Golden Gate Village for 13 years now, and it’s been such a blessing for my family,” longtime resident Neil Hammari said in a news release. “We know we’re going to have to move out for the remodeling because there are a lot of deep repairs needed in the bathrooms and kitchens. But overall, we love this housing situation and look forward to moving back into a home with new countertops and new updates, and to spending many more years here.”

Ruth Dusseault is an investigative reporter and multimedia journalist focused on environment and energy. Her position is supported by the California local news fellowship, a statewide initiative spearheaded by UC Berkeley aimed at supporting local news platforms. While a student at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism (c’23), Ruth developed stories about the social and environmental circumstances of contaminated watersheds around the Great Lakes, Mississippi River and Florida’s Lake Okeechobee. Her thesis explored rights of nature laws in small rural communities. She is a former assistant professor and artist in residence at Georgia Tech’s School of Architecture, and uses photography, film and digital storytelling to report on the engineered systems that undergird modern life.