San Jose retail center could be replaced by affordable housing project

An affordable housing development with well over 100 units is being eyed on a San Jose site.

SAN JOSE — An affordable housing development with well over 100 units is being eyed on a San Jose site now occupied by a small retail strip center, a fresh example of a fast-shifting real estate landscape in the Bay Area.

The proposed development would be located at 1190 Hillsdale Avenue in San Jose, the site of a retail center next to Almaden Expressway.

The proposed development would consist of 160 apartments, according to a proposal on file with the San Jose Planning Department.

The residences in the project are described as “affordable multifamily units,” according to very preliminary plans on file at City Hall.

As prospects for office buildings and retail centers become murkier in a wobbly economy, real estate firms have increasingly turned to housing as a more fundamentally solid development option.

It wasn’t immediately clear which real estate development company had proposed the project.  An architectural firm filed the proposal.

What is clear, according to the planning documents, is that the project applicant seeks an expedited city planning review of the proposal using provisions in a state law known as SB 330. SB 330 can be used to limit the roadblocks that local governments can place in the path of a project proposal.

The property where the project would be built is a retail strip center that in September 2022 was put up for sale, according to a marketing brochure circulated by California Partners, a real estate firm.

The brochure stated the center was being listed for sale with an asking price of $3.5 million. The center is at the corner of Hillsdale Avenue and Newberry Avenue a few blocks west of the Capitol Expressway auto dealerships.

The property is currently owned by San Jose residents Anastasios Papapsomas and Argiroula Papapsomas, according to a real estate database.