SoCal housing is so unaffordable that billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott has made one more multi-million greenback donation to repair the issue

MacKenzie Scott is the reward that retains on giving—actually. The billionaire ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has made it her mission to dump a lot of the fortune she gained from their divorce, and recently she’s targeted on combating the affordable housing crisis in California.

Within the newest of her string of donations to California-based inexpensive housing nonprofit organizations, Scott made an “surprising reward” of $15 million to Culver Metropolis, Calif.-based Century Housing, which funds, builds, and operates multi-family rental housing all through the state. In September, Scott had additionally made an $8 million gift to San Francisco-based BRIDGE Housing and a $20 million donation to the San Francisco Neighborhood Land Belief.

This newest donation got here as hire virtually utterly eats the earnings of many Southern California residents. As of July, the common month-to-month hire for a Los Angeles condo is greater than $2,700 according to RentCafe, an web itemizing service for rental properties. That’s almost 60% the common month-to-month earnings of a U.S. grownup, CEIC data shows.

“Our work is extra pressing than ever as rents proceed to rise, placing extra Californians liable to housing instability, together with teams just like the working poor and seniors,” a Century Housing spokesperson tells Fortune. “We are going to use this outstanding reward to extend the provision of inexpensive housing in SoCal by means of our investments and developments, working with our many companions to supply housing safety for extra residents—and to finally construct extra equitable, thriving communities.”

Plus, shopping for a house in California is not possible for many individuals, with only 16% of residents qualifying to purchase a median-priced single-family house in the course of the second quarter of this 12 months, the California Affiliation of Realtors reported in August. And most of the people can neglect about proudly owning a house in San Francisco. The common house value there’s greater than $1.2 million, according to Zillow, though it’s down by 9% year-over-year.

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Century Housing traditionally has supported rental tasks for residents who earn a mean of fifty% of the world median revenue degree (AMI), which equates roughly to rents round 55% of the market fee, the spokesperson says.

Scott’s unrestricted donation will assist the group spend money on extra inexpensive housing tasks just like 1064 Mission Street, a everlasting supportive housing website in San Francisco, and Red Tail Crossing, a supportive housing challenge in Los Angeles.

Century Housing Corp., the group’s group improvement monetary wing, additionally lends to builders of inexpensive housing for low-income residents and workforce housing for moderate-income residents who sometimes don’t qualify for sponsored housing, the spokesperson says. One such challenge is 231 Grant in Palo Alto, Calif., which can supply 110 inexpensive housing models for Bay Space educators. Additionally within the works is a 131-unit challenge in Petaluma, an hour north of San Francisco,, for residents incomes at or under 30% to 60% of the world’s median revenue.

Since making her Giving Pledge in 2019, Scott has given away greater than $14 billion to greater than 1,600 non-profit organizations targeted on fixing a wide range of issues, in addition to universities, in keeping with the Yield Giving web page. Scott’s net worth continues to be at $38.1 billion, in keeping with Forbes. Her supersized philanthropy has largely been impressed by her “impulse to assist somebody,” she wrote in December 2021.

“For those who assume you know the way a lot impression would possibly stream from performing on any of your personal impulses to present, you might be virtually definitely improper,” Scott wrote. “Every distinctive expression of generosity may have worth far past what we will think about or dwell to see.”

This story was initially featured on Fortune.com