SAN JOSE — A Bay Area group has bought a former fraternity house in downtown San Jose where a developer had once eyed, but never built, affordable homes.
The one-time fraternity house was bought for $3.25 million, according to documents filed on Sept. 4 with the Santa Clara County Recorder’s Office.
First Community Housing, acting through an affiliate, sold the property to the new ownership group. In 2020, First Community Housing paid $5.6 million for the fraternity house.
At one point, Sigma Nu Fraternity had operated a house for its Zeta Iota Chapter at the property, which is located at 155 South 11th Street, about a block from the main downtown campus of San Jose State University.
In 2021, First Community had proposed the development of a 91-unit, seven-story affordable housing project at the site. The project never broke ground.
First Community, however, began to run into financial difficulties that were severe enough that the affordable housing developer was described as becoming “financially overextended and unable to meet all of its financial obligations,” according to a city staff report prepared in 2022.
The affordable housing firm later decided to drastically scale back its development plans and sell off some properties it had built.
The three-story building totals 10,900 square feet and contains 25 bedrooms, according to multiple commercial and residential property databases.
It wasn’t immediately clear what plans the new ownership group has for the building.