PLYMOUTH — A new housing development for seniors has opened on Fairgrounds Road and is already fully occupied.

Pemi Commons was built by Southern New Hampshire Services using federal Housing and Urban Development grant funds.

Sixteen new housing units, which are available to low-income people who are at least 62, are now open after a winter and summer of construction, said Phil Grandmaison, senior projects director for SNHS.

This project means that SNHS has about 790 apartments available to seniors in 23 complexes in the Granite State and one in Berwick, Maine, not including three other projects under construction in Woodstock, Lancaster and Manchester, said William Hart, facilities and housing development director for SNHS.

Hart offered a tour of the facility Wednesday. It has a front lobby, community room with kitchen and television, a library with a computer, and a central laundry. Each of the one-floor, 550-square-foot units has a bedroom, kitchen, living room and bath, he said.

SNHS has built housing in Nashua, Manchester, Bristol, Rochester, Ashland, Portsmouth, Greenfield, Raymond, Northwood, Deerfield and Berwick, Maine, and recently completed a project in Campton near the Owl's Nest golf course.

Qualifying low-income seniors pay 30 percent of their incomes to live in the apartments.

“Town officials were helpful throughout the process,” said Grandmaison of Sharon Penney and her zoning and planning staff.

He added that the seller of the land, Ed Sleeper of Golden Rule Construction, “was very cooperative while the site was under agreement and our application was before HUD.”

Hart said the 16-unit, two-story project off Alpine Drive in Woodstock will be open in December and a 20-unit project under way in Lancaster is 30 percent complete and will likely open next summer.

An addition to a building at 850 Hayward St. in Manchester is also going forward with a final phase, Hart said, adding 16 units to round out the project to 72 units.

ptracy@unionleader.com