At the time of the United States entry into World War II in December 1941, the Defense Homes Corporation (a component of the Federal Housing Administration) had purchased most of the area. The corporation was created by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1940 through the allocation of emergency funding and, by February 1942, it had assembled for construction of housing for civilian and military defense personnel to be called Seminary Heights. The site was only from the Pentagon which had begun construction in August 1941. As with nearby Parkfairfax, Alexandria, and several other sites throughout metropolitan Washington, the Corporation endeavored to quickly satisfy increased wartime demand for housing and, by the end of 1943, by which time the project was renamed Fairlington, there were almost 2,415 housing units completed. By 1945, there were 3,439 units when the project was completed at a cost of $35 million ($368 million in dollars).