Officials from local towns and cities got a brisk three-hour tour this morning of a half dozen affordable-housing projects built in the region over the past decade, and the consensus was that “affordable” these days doesn’t translate as “cheap.”

“It was a good mix of housing, a mix of opportunities, a mix of pricing and a mix of construction options,” said Salem Selectman Elbert M. Burr. “It’s great for the neighborhood.”

Dan Steward, Waterford’s first selectman, said the term affordable housing is a misnomer, in a sense.

“This is quality housing,” he said. “People are worried about things that people don’t need to worry about.”

The Southeastern Connecticut Housing Alliance sponsored the tour, attended by about three dozen officials and affordable-housing advocates. Norton Wheeler, chairman of the housing alliance board and principal of the construction firm Mystic River Building, said the idea behind the tour was to update officials about how different towns have embraced affordable housing options.

“We wanted people to see a broad range of what has been built in our area and take the stigma off of affordable housing,” Wheeler said.

David Fink, policy director at the Hartford-based Partnership for Strong Communities, said that with Baby Boomers downsizing and millennials with educational debt reticent about taking the plunge into single-family homeownership, the demand for multifamily housing has been booming. And some towns, such as East Lyme and Old Saybrook, have been trying hard to ensure that people from all walks of life can find a place to live in their community.

“They’ve been very proactive in assessing their housing needs,” he said.

In Old Saybrook, tour participants began by visited Ferry Crossing, 16 rental apartments that were the first in Connecticut to be developed in an Incentive Housing Zone, and Eastpointe Saybrook Junction, a proposed apartment project on North Main Street that will be 20 percent affordable and is close to the town’s railroad station.

SeaSpray and Seaside Village in East Lyme and Davis Farm and City Flats in New London were the other affordable-housing projects on the tour.

“A lot of places are doing really, really great things,” said Fink, the affordable-housing advocate.

“They all seem to fit into their areas very nicely,” said Burr, the Lyme selectman.

One of the keys, said housing experts, is that the newest developments offer the latest energy efficiencies, including extensive insulation, that keeps costs down for struggling homeowners. At City Flats, for instance, the condominiums have 2 inches of spray foam and energy-efficient, on-demand boilers, expected to keep monthly bills well under $100.

City Flats has used historic tax credits to save money and keep monthly costs for homeowners down well below market rental rates, even when taxes and insurance are included.

Waterford official Steward said one key takeaway from the tour was that tax credits are important to making affordable-housing developments work.

But the main thing, said builder Wheeler, is understanding that affordable housing doesn’t have to look cheap.

“Everyone has a real misconception of what affordable looks like,” he said. “Of the places we saw today, there was not a place I would feel uncomfortable living in.”