Summary:

• When Breaktime, a growing Boston-based nonprofit, recognized owning a building could deepen the impact of its services, it turned to Eastern Bank’s Community Development Lending team for financing.
• Now, as the owner of a five-floor building in downtown Boston, Breaktime is creating the Hub for Solving Young Adult Homelessness, a one-stop shop for helping young adults experiencing homelessness. 

Read more about how Breaktime was able to structure the financing for a game-changing real estate purchase, and its learnings for other nonprofits interested in doing the same. 

Overview: 

Sometimes the signs of homelessness can be challenging to identify – especially among young adults – but the impacts are no less disruptive and damaging. Only a tiny fraction (less than 10%) actually live on the streets. More often, homelessness for young adults ages 18-25 translates into “couch surfing” from friend to friend, sleeping in a car, or moving from relative to relative, all while scrambling to find employment and healthcare. What’s more, the impact is disproportionately felt: Nearly 90% of young adults experiencing homelessness identify as Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC), and 40% are members of the LGBTQ community (Sources: Chapin Hall; National Alliance to End Homelessness; True Colors Fund). 

Founded in 2018, Boston-based Breaktime aims to break the cycle of homelessness by equipping young adults with the job skills and financial security they need to establish long-term housing security. By providing job training, wraparound services, and financial support, this nonprofit works to ensure that every young person has access to job opportunities at a livable wage. 

While participating in Breaktime’s core program, many young adults would express to Breaktime how difficult it was to navigate the broader resource landscape and access things like showers, laundry services, and healthcare. Breaktime saw an opportunity in a changing commercial real estate market where, if it could raise enough money to purchase a building, the feasibility of creating a hub to co-locate all of these services would be possible. 

A New Home for Solving Homelessness 

Thanks to loan assistance from Eastern Bank, Breaktime purchased a building of its own to deepen the impact of the programs it offers. The Breaktime Hub for Solving Young-Adult Homelessness, a five-story facility at 63 Franklin St. in downtown Boston, represents an innovative approach to addressing youth homelessness by creating a comprehensive, one-stop source of support and opportunity that addresses each of the diverse and interconnected needs of unhoused young adults. 

“Having a place that’s truly our own is a game-changer for our organization,” said Connor Schoen, Executive Director and Co-Founder of Breaktime. “Now we can truly invest in our mission and customize our facilities to meet the unique needs of the community we serve. Eastern Bank has been a steadfast, irreplaceable resource for Breaktime, supporting us financially and strategically.” 

The relationship with Breaktime goes back to 2019, when the Eastern Bank Foundation began its philanthropic support of the nonprofit. “Breaktime is doing incredibly important and impactful work supporting a very vulnerable community of people,” said Nancy Huntington Stager, President and CEO of the Eastern Bank Foundation. 

During the same year, Breaktime became a banking client of Eastern Bank. “We respect and admire Eastern Bank’s commitment to the community,” said Schoen. “It being community-based and easily accessible are large reasons we chose to work with Eastern Bank as our bank. We opened up a money market account with a great interest rate that yields money we can put right back into our program work. We’re always able to get questions answered and problems solved by a person we know, and that personal connection is meaningful to us at all levels – from the Chair to the tellers at our local branch.” 

The Right Financial Foundation to Make it Happen 

Leveraging its decades of leadership providing tax-exempt bond financing and multi-layered leverage loans, Eastern Bank’s Community Development Lending team facilitated a financing structure with MassDevelopment to make the real estate transaction possible, purchasing a $5.5 million tax-exempt bond to finance Breaktime’s property acquisition. This provided a discounted interest rate because of Breaktime’s tax-exempt status. Eastern Bank also arranged bridge financing (also tax-exempt) to fund the renovations. 

“This structure was very important and beneficial to Breaktime,” Eastern Bank Senior Vice President of Community Development Lending Lisa Sheehan said, “because it meant they wouldn’t need to pull money from their operating funds to fund buying the building. Their programs and services would be unaffected by this purchase.” 

Breaktime realized that, as a building owner, property management would become a critical function. They chose Third Sector New England, a nonprofit, to provide affordable property-management services. 

“The new Breaktime Hub truly deepens the impact of our programs and will significantly increase the number of young adults experiencing housing insecurity we can serve. It also opens up brand new ways we can support our young adults, like co-locating a clinic devoted to the healthcare needs of young adults right on our second floor. We’re now able to pursue some lofty goals because we have our own space that we can configure to our vision. We couldn’t have achieved this without the assistance of Eastern Bank.”

The Community Development Lending Department at Eastern Bank can help you understand a range of available financing and credit resources to help your non-profit organization thrive. Contact us to learn more. 

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