Monte Anderson Shares Vision to Create Affordable ‘Micro Homes’ in Oak Cliff Shopping Center

What’s one to do with a suburban shopping center with way too much parking in an area that desperately needs more affordable housing? 

Build some affordable housing, that’s what. 

Realtor and developer Monte Anderson with Options Real Estate owns the site at 3939 S. Polk St., which was built in the 1960s. He’s requesting rezoning that would change the Golden Triangle Shopping Center property from regional retail to walkable mixed-use. Anderson wants to construct 12 one-story “micro homes” that would rent for less than $1,000 per month each. 

“I hope for the best but I’m prepared for the worst,” Anderson said, acknowledging that the rezoning may not be approved. “The City of Dallas doesn’t include me on anything they do in Southern Dallas and I’ve got successful projects that are being done without subsidy all over the place.”

Who Will Live There?

Anderson has created this type of development before — and he believes there’s proof that it works. 

“I myself live in a similar unit,” he said. “I live in downtown Duncanville across the street from a 24-hour tire store above a cheap Chinese restaurant. A train runs by all the time. It’s a very noisy area. Not everybody likes that, and if you don’t like it, you shouldn’t live here.” 

He envisions that single women over 60 will be drawn to the Polk Street development in South Oak Cliff. 

“I’m a guy that does not build cheap stuff,” Anderson said. “I build really good stuff, but it’s small. Women are living longer and are healthy. In this area, there’s a grocery store, a daycare, and four places to eat that they can walk to. Because I’m rebuilding this in a parking lot, I’m not throwing this shopping center in a landfill. A lot of people use this shopping center for their grocery store.” 

The million-dollar question, though, is could it have a negative impact on the surrounding neighborhoods?

“Will somebody that was homeless be able to live here? I hope so,” Anderson said. “I’m not interested in all homeless, all elderly, all low-income, or all yuppies from Bishop Arts. I’m interested in a mixture of all the above.” 

The surrounding area includes the high-income Golf Club of Dallas, formerly Oak Cliff Country Club, which was purchased in 2020 by Dr. Tony Evans’ megachurch, Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship. 

There are also 200-unit apartment buildings to the north. Some of the neighbors’ concerns about Anderson’s development, he said, sound racist and classist. 

“They don’t want any poor minorities moving in there,” he said. “They want me to put big houses in. The poor people are already here.  We’ve got mentally ill and poor people. What should I do, run them off to the next neighborhood?”

Anderson said he’s offered to meet with residents and give site tours, and he’s held one community meeting. If the rezoning is approved, it would take about eight or nine months to build the homes, he added.  

Those less fortunate respond well to a hand up rather than a handout, Anderson explained. Case in point: Helen’s Project, a center on Polk Street that helps low-income and homeless people find housing.

“It’s got a shower, food, and clothing,” Anderson said. “They quit breaking in because we give it to them. There’s no one laying on the porches anymore because they can just come inside. It works. The war on poverty, homelessness, and drugs has never worked. We should have compassion.”

Economic Development

Anderson said his project meets the goals for economic development in the area and “is a whole lot more humane” than projects in Bishop Arts or West Dallas. 

“Gentrification is pushing the middle class down,” he said. “That puts more pressure on the homeless and mentally ill. We should house them wherever they are.”

And despite some early opposition on social media, Anderson said there is a market for this type of housing. 

“If this project wasn’t there and I said I’m going to build a mixed-use development with 12 units, four restaurants, and a daycare, people would fall all over it,” he said. “This is a really good project, a cutting-edge project. We’re doing something very decent, and to scale. We can’t afford to tear down all these shopping centers and put them in the landfill. The stuff we do, it’s proven that we actually care about the neighborhood. We’re just regular middle-class people ourselves.”

The 500-square-foot homes would improve the shopping center — a better deal for the community than selling it to an investor, Anderson said. 

“If I would have known what was going to happen to the Belmont Hotel, I never would have sold it,” Anderson said. “In fact, when I sold it [in 2015], I bought this shopping center. I reinvested 100 percent of the profit into crappy properties to fix up. I hate what happened there. I didn’t have the hotel for sale when it sold. They came to me.” 

Anderson said he believes in responsible development and giving back to the community where he was raised. He’s worked in real estate for 30-plus years and has focused his “attention, money, emotional, and mental health and support on southern Dallas County.”

“It’s where I grew up,” he said. “It’s my home. It’s the philosophy I teach. Locals can be better developers of their community. The money is important, but doing good is equally important. I’m a capitalist. I’m not a socialist. Those of us that have the abilities and resources should be more responsible for what we do.”