Eighteen new duet-style homes have opened on Kirk Avenue in East San Jose's Alum Rock neighborhood, offering four-bedroom layouts priced between $1.08 million and $1.25 million on a lot that used to hold a single demolished house. City and community leaders gathered to celebrate the opening of the development, called The Kirk, which its builder is pitching as a step toward helping working families afford homes in the Bay Area.
According to NBC Bay Area, the 18 homes are 100% electric and solar-ready, and the project includes two below-market-rate homes for qualified buyers along with tax incentives for first-time homebuyers. San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan attended the celebration and said the development is part of a broader effort to address the city's affordable housing crisis, per the station's report.
The homes range from 1,481 to 1,909 square feet, according to Trulia. The 1.49-acre site was annexed from Santa Clara County into San Jose and prezoned for planned development, and clearing it required demolishing a 1,088-square-foot single-family home and removing 26 trees, according to City of San Jose planning filings. The property sits directly across Kirk Avenue from Linda Vista Elementary School, according to CEQAnet environmental review documents.
A Builder Betting on Single-Family Infill
The Kirk was built by AL Homes, an AlphaX Capital company that is pursuing a much larger statewide push. The builder has plans to construct more than 200 single-family homes and townhouses valued above $400 million across Silicon Valley, Orange County, and the Inland Empire, according to Redfin. Redfin describes the firm as specializing in energy-efficient infill single-family and townhouse developments.
The pricing at The Kirk lands close to the local baseline for East San Jose. The median home value in the surrounding 95127 zip code stood at roughly $1.09 million to $1.10 million in mid-2026, down slightly year-over-year, per Redfin's zip code data. That figure is well below the citywide median sale price for single-family homes in San Jose, which reached $1.635 million in mid-2026, according to JLee Realty.
Fitting Into San Jose's Affordability Push
The two below-market-rate units built into the project reflect San Jose's Inclusionary Housing Ordinance, which the city updated in January 2026 to streamline compliance while keeping set-aside requirements that push residential developments to include affordable units or pay in-lieu fees, according to the City of San Jose. That framework is one of the tools the city is leaning on to meet a state mandate: under California's 6th cycle Regional Housing Needs Allocation, San Jose must accommodate 62,200 new housing units across income tiers between 2023 and 2031.
Mahan's appearance at the ribbon-cutting comes as he runs for California governor, a campaign he launched in January with local housing supply and shelter strategies at the center of his platform, as Hoodline previously reported. His platform has emphasized streamlined permitting and quick-build housing solutions as ways to move projects like The Kirk forward faster.
Other Housing Efforts Nearby
The Kirk is not the only housing effort taking shape in the immediate area. Near Kirk Avenue, the Alum Rock Union Elementary School District approved plans in March to build 78 workforce housing units for teachers and staff at the Renaissance Academy at Mathson campus on Kammerer Avenue, a project Hoodline covered when the district signed off on it. Together, the two developments show local public and private players both turning to East San Jose land to chip away at the region's housing shortage, even as the neighborhood's home prices stay far below what buyers face elsewhere in San Jose.
