An old elementary school in Beatrice, Nebraska, has been transformed into Stoddard Place, a residential site for seniors 55 and older. The $6.4 million renovation of the former Stoddard Elementary School, which was closed in 2024 when the school district consolidated four aging campuses, marks a new use for the building. The project now provides senior housing units for residents aged 55 and older.
Jake Hoppe of Lincoln-based Hoppe Development, the private development company leading the Stoddard transformation, stated, “With the cost of new infrastructure being really high, you’ve got people looking at every building and asking, ‘Could this be converted to housing?’ – schools fall into that.” The project was boosted by competitive low-income housing tax credits covering more than half the cost. Of the 25 units, 20 are to go to seniors with incomes below the area’s median income. The rest will be leased at the market rate, with rents ranging from $645 to as high as $1,300 for the market rate units, according to project manager Connor Menard.
Hoppe Development soon will start a second Stoddard phase, a batch of 45 townhome-style rental dwellings, roughly an $11.7 million project, which will rise south of the senior units and be reserved largely for families that earn less than the median income. Equity from low-income tax credits will cover about $7 million of the later phase, which also taps city-approved tax increment financing. Seven of the southern units will be rented at market rate, creating a mixed-income environment. A feature of the new-construction townhomes will be a medical exam room staffed by Beatrice Community Hospital, as well as a food pantry. A new city-owned playground area sits between the two sites.
Beatrice’s residential infusion comes as Nebraska and the nation continue to combat a housing shortage fueled by factors including high land, labor and construction expenses, low and aging housing stock, and financing barriers. Various efforts have flowed since a wide-ranging group of government and other Nebraska leaders in 2023 declared a housing crisis and developed a strategic plan, goals and working groups. The latest housing study of Beatrice and the broader Gage County identified high lease amounts and scarcity of available and decent properties as barriers for renters. That 2021 report also pointed out that the county’s fastest-growing age group is 55- to 64-year-olds.
Keith County’s Ogallala is another Nebraska city partnering with a private developer and tapping various economic development tools to repurpose a school building. Key to many such projects is the low-income housing tax credit program, a public-private partnership where the state and federal governments trade tax breaks for low-rent housing commitments. An old Ogallala school, built over a century ago and vacated in 2015, is to be repurposed as apartments, with the gym a healthy living and community space.
