Episode
Highlights
A REFUGEE'S DREAM
Alphonse Mupenzi is a refugee from the Congo. About a decade ago, violence forces him to flee his home country with his wife and three young kids.
“In my culture, if you have a home, you have a country. If you don’t have a home, you are moving. Today, you here. Tomorrow, you are other side. In French, we say nomad. So that’s number one. Number two is I have kids. I just want to give them stability, to be stable. Number three is kind of business. For income, to earn more, yeah.”
—ALPHONSE

Alphonse Mupenzi outside of his home in Providence | Photo: Alex Nunes
AFFORDABLE HOUSING
“The usage of those, what we consider those kind of iconic triple deckers and double deckers, has changed dramatically.”
—BRENDA
Triple decker home prices have more than doubled since the Great Recession, and the reason boils down to pretty basic math. Lots of people want them. But the number of triple deckers is limited, and we don’t make new ones like we used to.
“Because we just have simply not been producing enough affordable housing over the past 10, 20 years, we see more and more pressure on that rental stock. Supply is limited, demand is steady and growing, and price goes up.”
—BRENDA
“The triple decker now, like most housing, is a commodity. It’s not about the sentiment of the place. It’s not about finding a place where you know you’re going to live a long time, for many people. Now you have international money with lots of cash to spend on transforming the triple decker into simply another way to make money in a portfolio of lots of money.”
—MARC

Taylor Bearden outside one of his renovated triple deckers in Worcester, Mass. | Photo: Alex Nunes
MEET A GENTRIFIER
“So we’re really creating these spaces where we’re taking the existing footprint of the triple decker and converting it into something that has all the amenities you might expect in a normal home today.”
—TAYLOR
He says renters, including immigrants, need affordable housing, but those options might not be available anyway if absentee landlords keep letting their buildings fall apart. Those buildings could end up condemned or torn down and then no one can live in them.
"THAT'S MY DREAM"
Alphonse is working in the laundry department at Rhode Island Hospital, and his kids are enrolled in school now. He’s also still holding onto that goal of someday owning his own triple decker.
“Yes, that’s my dream. Yeah, I’m praying for that. Yeah.”
—ALPHONSE