Overcoming Setbacks Unique Housing Needs Of Disabled Not An Insurmountable Problem

If your last foray into the home market made you think finding the ideal house is hard, try finding the perfect handicap-accessible home.

Century 21 Advanta real estate agent Chylene Ward is dedicating her career to helping people with disabilities do just that.

At 16, Ward was thrown through a car’s windshield in an accident that left her legs paralyzed. Now 26, she was featured last month in the national Realtor Magazine as one of 30 notable real estate professionals under age 30. She also serves as president of Spokane’s Coalition for Responsible Disabled (CORD).

Ward, whose ads use photos of herself in her wheelchair, says about 80 percent of her business involves working for people with disabilities. Many seek her out, she said, because she relates to their unique needs.

An online search of the Spokane multiple listing service reveals thousands of houses with “handicap-accessible features,” but the actual number of handicap-accessible homes on the market is only a handful, Ward said.

“A lot of times they will call (houses) handicap-accessible because it is main floor living,” she says. “The washer and dryer are on the first floor.”

But it takes more than that to make a home fully accessible, she says.

For a person using a wheelchair, hallways and doorways must be wider than in a standard home. All appliances must be accessible on the first floor. If there are stairs to the front door, there must be a ramp.

Bathrooms must be larger. Sinks need to have enough space beneath them for a wheelchair to roll under.

The costs of retrofitting a home range from a few hundred dollars to thousands, depending on the house design and the degree of the home owner’s disability, says Ward.

Houses that have been retrofitted usually only come on the market when someone dies or moves to another community.

“If they’ve had their house retrofitted, they want to stay,” says Ward, “because that house was designed for them.”

Often people with disabilities don’t look into home ownership because they think they won’t be able to find the right home or they won’t qualify for a loan, says Mona Bates, a real estate agent for Tomlinson Black.

“A lot of people with a disability become frustrated or upset because they don’t realize how much work it will take to get them in a home,” she says. “I wish they didn’t look at it as a barrier, because if they start now we can have them in a home in six to nine months.”

Bates and Ward say that even living on a fixed income isn’t necessarily an insurmountable obstacle to home ownership.

CORD provides grants that can be used toward retrofitting homes, says Ward.

The Washington state Housing Finance Commission offers a loan program called HomeChoice, which offers first-time home buyer assistance to low- and mid-income people with disabilities, says Washington Trust loan officer Emily Faylor.

The program can be used to purchase an existing home for up to $106,000 or a new home priced up to $134,000. Qualified buyers get a reduced interest rate and up to $15,000 toward their down payment.

Maximum household income to participate in the program is $48,000 for one- or two-person families and $55,000 for families of three or more. An able-bodied buyer can qualify if he or she has a spouse or child with a disability.

Last year, says Faylor, about 30 Spokane homebuyers took advantage of the program. That number, she says, could be higher.

“There is little in the way of advertising about the program, so there are many people who aren’t aware of it.”

Around town

The Lyons Theater closed last week when Regal Cinemas sold the facility to two Spokane investors for $1.375 million.

Mike Hume, one of the purchasers, said he and his partner also own the adjacent K-Mart Plaza. The Lyons site will be leased, and Hume said the theater building can be renovated or a new structure can be built to suit a new tenant’s needs.

“We’re not going to operate a theater,” he said, “and part of our purchase agreement was that we not lease it out as a theater.”

Edwards LaLone Travel is launching a new honeymoon registry. Brides’ and grooms’ friends and family will be able to purchase gift certificates toward the couple’s planned vacation.