Pointe Common: Affordable Housing on Fullerton's Old Mustard Factory Site
By Eric Engelbert
On a narrow triangular lot at 1600 W. Commonwealth Avenue, wedged between the city maintenance yard and the railroad corridor, Fullerton has built one of its clearest examples of turning idle public land into housing. The project is Pointe Common, a 65-unit affordable apartment community that opened in 2026. What makes it worth a closer look is not just the building, but the history of the ground it sits on and the public process that got it there.
A Site With Deep Fullerton History
This parcel was not always vacant. For roughly 60 years it held the historic Kohlenberger building, which later became well known as the production facility for Morehouse Mustard, a longtime Fullerton manufacturer. That building burned down in 2007, leaving the site empty.
Public records show the roughly 63,000-square-foot structure on the site, originally dating to around 1900, last sold in December 2008 for about $4.49 million, in the aftermath of the fire. The land eventually came into the City of Fullerton's ownership, and after the mustard factory era ended, the lot sat undeveloped for well over a decade, a familiar sight along this stretch of Commonwealth near the rail line.
From Surplus City Land to Affordable Housing
In June 2020, the City Council declared the roughly 2.5-acre Commonwealth Avenue property surplus. Under California's Surplus Land Act, cities that declare land surplus must make it available for uses like housing or parks, and prioritize affordable housing. That designation set the project in motion.
The city solicited affordable housing proposals and, in 2021, moved forward with a development concept for the site. The plan evolved over the next two years, growing from an initial concept of around 59 units to 62 and finally to 65. In April 2023, the City Council unanimously approved the project and rezoned the 2.5-acre parcel from industrial to residential to allow it. The community was ultimately developed by Meta Development with WSH Management operating the property.
What Was Built
Pointe Common is a single residential building of two to three-story massing, totaling roughly 70,000 square feet, with 65 apartments plus surface parking, open space, and a family tot lot. The unit mix is family-oriented: 29 one-bedroom, 19 two-bedroom, and 17 three-bedroom homes, ranging from about 579 to 1,126 square feet, including a unit reserved for the on-site property manager.
The location gives residents a genuinely walkable setting near local parks, shopping, and restaurants, with public transportation and the Fullerton rail corridor close by. The community is now open and leasing, with advertised rents starting in the range of roughly $950 depending on unit type and income eligibility.
Who It Serves and How It Was Funded
Pointe Common is income-restricted affordable housing, not market-rate. It serves families earning roughly 30 to 70 percent of the area median income, with a large share of the units set aside for households at the lower end of that range. The affordability is locked in for the long term through a 55-year covenant, and the city attached a deed restriction ensuring a portion of the units stays affordable indefinitely.
The project was financed largely through federal and state Low-Income Housing Tax Credits. In late 2023, the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee reserved about $2.5 million in annual federal credits and roughly $11.4 million in total state credits for the development, with Redstone Equity as the tax credit investor. This is the standard financing structure that makes deed-restricted affordable housing possible, since these rents cannot support conventional construction financing on their own.
Parking and Site Cleanup
The approved project includes 108 parking spaces, seven of them for guests. Six spaces were built with electric vehicle charging, and another 38 were designed to be easily adapted for future charging stations, which is increasingly standard for new California multifamily construction.
Given the site's industrial past and the 2007 fire, environmental review was a fair question. The city prepared an Initial Study and Mitigated Negative Declaration under CEQA, and notably found that the property was not on the state's list of hazardous materials sites. In other words, no formal contamination cleanup was flagged for the parcel, and the project moved forward with standard environmental mitigations rather than a major remediation.
Questions About Housing in Fullerton?
Applications for the income-restricted units at Pointe Common are handled directly by the property's management and its waitlist, not by our office, so if you are looking to apply for an affordable unit, contact the community directly. For everything else in the Fullerton market, whether you are buying, selling, or investing, I am happy to help.
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