For more than 24 years, Melanie Stewart, a longtime Yampa Valley resident, has called the Milner Mobile Home Park home.

“I’ve always known that I’ve lived on rented land,” Stewart said Monday when asked about the offer the Milner Park Community Co-op made to purchase the park late last week. “To know that our neighborhood will be here long-term with reasonable costs … We will still have monthly (lot) fees because we must pay the loan, our operating costs and build our reserve, but to know that it is going towards just securing our long-term housing — that makes it worth it.”

The Milner Park Community cooperative, a group that includes Stewart and five other residents representing the 40 homes, offered $7.75 million for the property. That offer, accepted last week by investor-based MHS Parks, holds an anticipated closing date in early February.

The offer was made possible thanks to a philanthropic loan through the Yampa Valley Housing Accelerator fund of the Yampa Valley Community Foundation. The revolving loan fund is seeded by several generous gifts from anonymous donors and offers attractive terms.

“We’re giving the (cooperative) very attractive terms that enable them to keep their rents more or less where they are now,” said Tim Wohlgenant, the foundation’s CEO. “It’s very attractive and well below market. In fact, the first few years of this loan are zero interest.”

In line with the foundation’s goal of building and preserving affordable housing, the organization has also provided loans to the Craig housing authority for a 20-unit project in Craig, as well as a loan to Gorman & Company to build an affordable housing project in Hayden.

“The residents of the Milner Mobile Home Park are valuable members of our community – construction workers, school district employees, home cleaners, retirees, families,” Wohlgenant said. “As a foundation, we are very focused on protecting the most vulnerable and safeguarding a diverse and thriving community.”

The offer to purchase the property was announced last Friday, but Stewart said the cooperative still has plenty on its plate as it performs due diligence on the transaction and works toward an anticipated February closing.

Once the sale closes the co-op will still need to pay the loan, meet operating costs and build a good reserve fund to meet any contingencies or emergencies.

Stewart said an outpouring of support from the community has been a boost, with local businesses making donations to support fundraisers and community members coming forward with donations to support the group’s effort to purchase the park.

Last Saturday the group raised nearly $7,000 as part of a fundraiser that will be used for closing costs. Donations can also be made through the Routt County Workforce Housing Preservation Fund that will be used to assist residents and homeowners at Milner Mobile Home Park with the purchase of the park. If funds are not needed for Milner Mobile Home Park, donations will go toward the purchase, preservation or emergency capital improvements of other mobile home parks or low-income housing in Routt County.

Stewart, the incorporator of the Milner Park Community Co-op, is looking forward to the deal’s closing and said she is grateful for the efforts of the Yampa Valley Housing Authority, as well as the Yampa Valley Community Foundation, for recognizing the impact that they can make on the neighborhood.

“What’s great about this is that we’re not putting a Band-Aid on something, nobody’s lending us money to fix something temporarily,” Stewart said. “This is a systemic change. We’re saving a whole affordable housing neighborhood for 40 families, and not putting on a temporary fix … this is really a long-term solution for housing.”