Nearly 500 homes coming in Sturgis housing developments

STURGIS, S.D. — Affordable homes are scarce in the Black Hills.

In fact, for some towns like Sturgis specifically, the vacancy rate sits below one percent.

“When someone moves to town, they’re lucky if they find a place to rent or buy, and they essentially have to get that one because it will be occupied within a couple of hours,” said Daniel Ainslie, the City Manager for the City of Sturgis.

The city’s update to its housing study in 2019 found that the city had a one point nine percent vacancy rate.

The study also outlined the city’s population, which has grown nearly six percent in the last 10 years with the majority of the growth coming in the last five years.

Ainslie says three to five percent is the desired vacancy rate, which also reflects a good variety for homebuyers and renters.

“Really, in order to get those higher vacancy rates, we have to start getting into some additional supply,” Ainslie said.

New developments in the area look to do just that.

One development, which is west of the city in the area of Alder Place and Avalanch Road, will bring 350 to 450 homes starting in the low $200,000 over the next decade. The project will produce roughly 100 homes in the first phase.

“Looking in that one development, there’s an entire variety of housing styles to meet that entire need,” Ainslie said.

The other development, Garden Grove, is south of the city and is already seeing houses going up. Ainslie says that project will come in a couple phases and could provide some 90 homes. Still a third project he mentioned was a piece of land near Garden Grover that the City of Sturgis could purchase to help in the commercial and residential aspects.

The question then shifts to how long and how much growth it can support, as the expansions by the city are now nearing U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management land.

“We’ll be able to continue to grow for probably 20-25 years, but there is going to come a point, you know, in the future, when the community is not going to be able to grow because we’ll be up against federal property,” Ainslie said.

Pivot Construction hopes to begin the project along Avalanch Road in late summer, early fall.