Isiaka Bizumuremyi waited nine years for this moment.

In Concord, over 7,000 miles away from home, he has own new apartment. Very new, in fact.

The walls are still bare and the kitchen appliances had never been used. Just over a month after arriving in Concord from Kenya, Bizumuremyi moved into an apartment at the new Tamposi Brothers development on Pembroke Road. He is one of the first tenants in the 39-unit building, where the two-bedroom apartments are all rent-restricted and more affordable than market rate.

“It’s a good opportunity,” he said. “We’re always thinking about what’s next because we’ve been dreaming about coming here.”

The immigration process to the United States can be fraught with long waiting periods and uncertainty. Life in Kenya, Bizumuremyi came with “a lot of insecurities,” but it was where he was born and raised, aside from attending high school in Rwanda.

For Bizumuremyi, the ability to sign a lease at Pembroke Road meant he was able to move out of the hotel room in Concord he was staying in when he first arrived. Other refugees he arrived with were lodged in Manchester hotels as well. With the help of Ascentria Care Alliance, they were relocated to the new apartment building and given basic furniture to get them started.

The new Tamposi development is the first phase of a larger project that will continue to add to Concord’s housing stock at a dire time. Rental costs remain high, with vacancy rates well below market standards. Finding an apartment is hard, and prices often mean that signing a lease and paying the rent can be even harder for tenants.

Bizumuremyi has heard a consistent message since moving in – he’s lucky.

“It’s surprising because it’s a new building, like getting in, the application process is very hard,” he said. “It’s a good building. People say that we are lucky.”

The majority of units are reserved for tenants who make 60 percent of the area median income, which is $48,360 for one person in Merrimack Country. For these apartments, rent is $1,463 a month and the landlord pays for water, sewer, heat, hot water and trash collection. Four apartments are designated for people who make just less than that – 50 percent of the area median income, or an annual salary of $40,300. These apartments cost $1,204 per month, with the same utilities included.

All apartments are expected to be filled by the end of the year, according to developer Joe Tamposi.

To finance the development and provide affordable prices, the Tamposi Brothers received financing from a variety of channels – New Hampshire Housing, TD Bank, Strafford Capital Group and the state’s Invest NH program. Piecing together lines of equity and loans can be a large puzzle for projects, with each development requiring a different configuration.

The next pieces of the Pembroke Road project will add another 84 units and will open in two phases, with the first building at the end of the year and the final one by February, according to Tamposi.

To finance the second 84-unit portion, the Tamposi Brothers received a $3 million grant from the InvestNH program, which Gov. Chris Sununu introduced in 2022 with federal pandemic funding to accelerate affordable housing development in the state. The 50 projects that received awards are expected to be completed by the end of the year. Around the corner from the Pembroke Road Apartments, Davis Ridge on Sheep Davis Road was also financed with the state program and opened earlier this month.

In the Pembroke Road Apartments, Bizumuremyi has met other newly resettled immigrants, like Innocent Gakoko and Gilbert Curtons. They also waited roughly a decade to come to the United States. In New Hampshire, they’re now figuring things out together, he said.

Bizumuremyi hopes to become a translator. In addition to English he speaks French, Swahili, Kinyarwanda and other dialects. In the meantime, he plans to get a job at Target.

On his wrist, he keeps Kenya close with a beaded bracelet of the country’s red, black and green flag. But the United States was something he thought about, dreamed of, for so long before. Now he is finally calling Concord home.

“It’s a good place.”

Anyone interested in learning about housing at Pembroke Road can contact Hodges Development 603-224-9221, https://hodgescompanies.com/pembroke-road-2/.

Michaela Towfighi can be reached at mtowfighi@cmonitor.com.