taco hill condos~

[mrknowitall]

so i am in the toilet room at the bob after the lenny concert. i call it a lenny because thats all i wanted to see. anyways i wait my turn and get in the handi-stall. i see a wall-mount ad for condos-its some heritage hill house selling apts aka condos for 200k. this town is going condo crazy.

~discuss

[Nitro]

so i am in the toilet room at the bob after the lenny concert. i call it a lenny because thats all i wanted to see. anyways i wait my turn and get in the handi-stall. i see a wall-mount ad for condos-its some heritage hill house selling apts aka condos for 200k. this town is going condo crazy.

~discuss

I was in the same toilet room Thursday evening after seeing Carl Labove at Dr. Grinn's. I saw that ad in there as well. I was quite taken back by the 200 price tag. Seems high to me.

Nitro

[GRDadof3]

I was in the same toilet room Thursday evening after seeing Carl Labove at Dr. Grinn's. I saw that ad in there as well. I was quite taken back by the 200 price tag. Seems high to me.

Nitro

I'm going to assume you waited until mrknowitall was finished Nitro. Question, were the condos really called "Taco-Hill"?

There are a lot of apartment>condo projects going on (and coming up). I don't know how it will all shake out, but if they are priced right and fill a niche, then they should sell. I don't see the condo market cooling off quite as much as single-family suburban homes in the area, because most of the downtown condo buyers do not need to sell a home, IMO. If you cater to baby boomers or young buyers, you should do alright.

[Nitro]

I'm going to assume you waited until mrknowitall was finished Nitro. Question, were the condos really called "Taco-Hill"?

The only other person in said toilet room was an older gent. He didn't look like a knowitall to me.

I believe the ad was for the Puritan Hill Condos. Puritan, Taco, it's all the same.

I love some of the names that people dream up for condos, developments, subdivisions, and the like. One that still makes me chuckle was in metro Atlanta. It was called Perimeter Center

Nitro

[GRDadof3]

The only other person in said toilet room was an older gent. He didn't look like a knowitall to me.

I believe the ad was for the Puritan Hill Condos. Puritan, Taco, it's all the same.

I love some of the names that people dream up for condos, developments, subdivisions, and the like. One that still makes me chuckle was in metro Atlanta. It was called Perimeter Center

Nitro

Nothing like feeling on the "outs", but yet "at the center of it all" .

That building is historically called "The Puritan", but that certainly doesn't mean you have to stick with that name, sheesh! That's that Cannon&Co. outfit that is also doing Stoner Hill Condos. I think I saw on the Stoner Hill sign that only "one condo remained".

[bwindi25]

There are a ton of condos going in. I suggest people get their hands on the GR Metro Council study " Residential Market Potential for new neighborhoods, neighborhood centers, town centers, urban centers, and urban core" done by Zimmer/Volk Associates in 2004.

Basically, it says that in neighborhoods (urban centers) adjacent to downtown (urban core), Rowhouse/Live-Work spaces should price for $150,000-$225,000 for 1,000-1650sf (2004 dollars) and 750-1400sf Lofts should price from $100,000-175,000 in order to fit an affordability range of a significant number of households. According to the study, the annual market potential (not demand) for downtown neighborhoods is about 887 new households (435 households will be looking to rent apts/lofts, 164 of those will be looking to buy loft space, 105 will be looking to buy rowhouses and the remaining 183 will go for Single-family detached).

I worry we are over-saturating the market around downtown.

[mrknowitall]

when the market over flows i will be there when the taco chip crumbles and buy it all back at half prices. people are turning herit-rage hill houses into condos....this is maddning , GW bUSh will destroy the housing market in 06.

people are drawing too much attention to the housing now. its all over everybody is over extended on there loans with 120% loans and re-fi's intrest only. american is slipping back into slavery. we own nothing. and thats the problem. when ever people are making money the gov't comes in and messes it up. thats why i own avacado farms and futuristic bee polen houses. its a small take on the global economy. GW Bush doesnt mind me selling avacados-he knows i pay my taxes, and those trips to brazil were about the women.

-watch. mr. knowitall knows..

sidenote:

do you think women would get weirded out if this was in my bedroom?

i need a humidifer..

[GaryP]

There are a ton of condos going in. I suggest people get their hands on the GR Metro Council study " Residential Market Potential for new neighborhoods, neighborhood centers, town centers, urban centers, and urban core" done by Zimmer/Volk Associates in 2004.

Basically, it says that in neighborhoods (urban centers) adjacent to downtown (urban core), Rowhouse/Live-Work spaces should price for $150,000-$225,000 for 1,000-1650sf (2004 dollars) and 750-1400sf Lofts should price from $100,000-175,000 in order to fit an affordability range of a significant number of households. According to the study, the annual market potential (not demand) for downtown neighborhoods is about 887 new households (435 households will be looking to rent apts/lofts, 164 of those will be looking to buy loft space, 105 will be looking to buy rowhouses and the remaining 183 will go for Single-family detached).

I worry we are over-saturating the market around downtown.

here it is

http://www.gvmc.org/landuse/documents/executive_summary.pdf

It was a good read, but the entire read I wondered where exactly they were getting their numbers from. Example: Riverhouse and Icon are asking and getting as much as $250/square foot for their projects, but the study says they should be asking $175-$188. That is a huge difference.

I think they were extremely conservative when making their estimates, so hopefully we can support a few more projects before saturation.

[GaryP]

when the market over flows i will be there when the taco chip crumbles and buy it all back at half prices. people are turning herit-rage hill houses into condos....this is maddning , GW bUSh will destroy the housing market in 06.

people are drawing too much attention to the housing now. its all over everybody is over extended on there loans with 120% loans and re-fi's intrest only. american is slipping back into slavery. we own nothing. and thats the problem. when ever people are making money the gov't comes in and messes it up. thats why i own avacado farms and futuristic bee polen houses. its a small take on the global economy. GW Bush doesnt mind me selling avacados-he knows i pay my taxes, and those trips to brazil were about the women.

-watch. mr. knowitall knows..

sidenote:

do you think women would get weirded out if this was in my bedroom?

i need a humidifer..

That was some funy sh**

so knowitall, you're suggesting avocado farms and bee pollen houses for a good return? I'm calling my broker right now.

[GRDadof3]

I have a copy of the Zimmerman Volk study here somewhere......did they specify what they considered to be "urban core" vs. "urban center"?

[GRDadof3]

OK, the report says 355 total units (per year) for the "urban core" whatever is considered downtown, and 887 in the "urban center" areas, which are mixed used neighborhoods adjacent to downtown. They do show more as rental than owned, but it's not like a lot of NEW buildings are being added or previous commercial space being converted and added to the market, it's just apartments being converted to condos. If the condo payment is a few hundred bucks more than the rental payment would have been, what's the difference?

I do agree that many are overextended on their loans, but like I said, if you target first-time buyers or baby boomers, you should be OK (first time home-buyers are probably renting or living with 'rents), and baby boomers probably have the home paid off (or pretty close), and could take a hit on their house. If you're targeting the middle (2nd or 3rd time buyers, house to sell, lot's of toys with loans on them.....good luck to you).

and mrknowitall, if you can get them THAT far, I don't think the green frog will weird them out

[chgrnative]

when the market over flows i will be there when the taco chip crumbles and buy it all back at half prices. people are turning herit-rage hill houses into condos....this is maddning , GW bUSh will destroy the housing market in 06.

people are drawing too much attention to the housing now. its all over everybody is over extended on there loans with 120% loans and re-fi's intrest only. american is slipping back into slavery. we own nothing. and thats the problem. when ever people are making money the gov't comes in and messes it up. thats why i own avacado farms and futuristic bee polen houses. its a small take on the global economy. GW Bush doesnt mind me selling avacados-he knows i pay my taxes, and those trips to brazil were about the women.

-watch. mr. knowitall knows..

sidenote:

do you think women would get weirded out if this was in my bedroom?

i need a humidifer..

Yeah right, G.W. Bush's fault. Isn't he to blame for everything wrong in this world? (sarcasm)

[GR_Urbanist]

"this town is going condo crazy."

Sadly, on HH it is getting worse. The building I live in is going throgh one of these conversions, which oddly started just a month after we moved in. Thanks, Cannon and Co. We love the fact that we have to pick up and move after less than a year!

I'm puzzled at the logic of turning perfectly fine apartment buildings into 100,000.00 + condos which in the end uproots almost all the current tennents since most of them cannot afford $700 or $800 or $900 + rents for what are small, one bedroom apartments. These places are going for more than what my parents paid for their home just south of the Ottawa Hills neighborhood! Does that make any sense?! Students, newlyweds, ederly, single parents, low income individuals keep getting swept out as one apartment building after another gets this "cool city" makeover. I guess these guys, like Cannon and Co. see $$$ in marketing these buildings to suburbanites who think their lives are going to become like an episode of "Friends" when they move to these places. I'm glad to see people with intrest in the city, but isnt there room for everyone?

I for one am one of those people who will love to see the day when the real estate market falls in on itself and these sharks find themselves with empty buildings and millions in debt.

Enough of my ranting. It's time for a turkey sandwich.

[zenstyle]

I'll add my concerns along with GRUrbanist....

What I wonder/fear/dread is that these hip, happenin' pads might be purchased by Daddy or Mommy as starter equity for their already over-indulged adult brats. So you have a cool building (and most of them are truely cool) inhabited by, essentially, kids. How will these buildings be any different from the Hillmount, where parents footed the rent bill for their art-student kiddies? Will these enclaves turn into rowdy dens of litter and bad music, thus scaring away legitimate ADULT buyers?

Another thing I'm wondering is, since there are so few units in some of these buildings (as compared to, say, Plaza Towers,) how will the monthy maintenance fee break down? Won't it have to necessarily be big $$$ since it's shared out by so few homes in the building?

[And no, I don't think women would be "weirded out" by that green artifact. What about men? Would they be weirded out?]

[torgo]

Yah a little more balance would be nice. Right now the condo market is hot-hot-hot and the rental market is crap-crap-crap. The condo idea is good for the city in the sense that more people are owning a place and building equity, but like you said, we can't kick all the renters out. All our eggs can't be in one basket.

[dbrok]

That's that Cannon&Co. outfit that is also doing Stoner Hill Condos. I think I saw on the Stoner Hill sign that only "one condo remained".

I'm surprised the Stoner Hill sign is still there.

[GaryP]

Guys, I'd be surprised if the owner occupancy % in any of these neighborhoods we are talking about was over 50%. I think there is a ton of residential rental space on the market right now. www.rentgr.com

And Zen, what a horrible scenario that would be.

[mrknowitall]

i say:

why own this crappy apartment? i hate the leaky tub and its missing a claw foot. are you going to clean up this dump before you sell it to me or will i be startled in my sleep by the latest "da youpers" album at 3am by the rich hippie street gang living next door. you own this place. out the window goes the control.....owners.

tit for tat eh? sounds like more tit and less tat for owners... i own a house

in the burbs and a building downtown which i purposely infested with rats to eat the bumbs inside....but thats another issue.

i cant see paying to live in an apt and call it a condo, a loft is one thing, but a HH apt . no i dont accept it. i cant. i will deny anybody buying these condo-rooms acceptance in my mind as a owner of anything but an apartment. sorry. i will not knwo the pleasure of see them as a owner of this room.

"hi nice apatment. its a condo. ....No its a condoment."

whats next yorkcreek? condo that place out. everyones been there, its like camp over there....

[GRDadof3]

I'll add my concerns along with GRUrbanist....

What I wonder/fear/dread is that these hip, happenin' pads might be purchased by Daddy or Mommy as starter equity for their already over-indulged adult brats. So you have a cool building (and most of them are truely cool) inhabited by, essentially, kids. How will these buildings be any different from the Hillmount, where parents footed the rent bill for their art-student kiddies? Will these enclaves turn into rowdy dens of litter and bad music, thus scaring away legitimate ADULT buyers?

Another thing I'm wondering is, since there are so few units in some of these buildings (as compared to, say, Plaza Towers,) how will the monthy maintenance fee break down? Won't it have to necessarily be big $$$ since it's shared out by so few homes in the building?

[And no, I don't think women would be "weirded out" by that green artifact. What about men? Would they be weirded out?]

I think the maintenance fees would be way less for one of these buildings. Think of all the mechanical, window washing, tennis courts, pool, insurance, etc. that goes along with Plaza Towers. A place like Puritan is probably a lot less.

It's been a long time since I was a young lad, but are there really that many people whose parents buy them their first house/condo?

[bwindi25]

i say:

why own this crappy apartment? i hate the leaky tub and its missing a claw foot. are you going to clean up this dump before you sell it to me or will i be startled in my sleep by the latest "da youpers" album at 3am by the rich hippie street gang living next door. you own this place. out the window goes the control.....owners.

tit for tat eh? sounds like more tit and less tat for owners... i own a house

in the burbs and a building downtown which i purposely infested with rats to eat the bumbs inside....but thats another issue.

i cant see paying to live in an apt and call it a condo, a loft is one thing, but a HH apt . no i dont accept it. i cant. i will deny anybody buying these condo-rooms acceptance in my mind as a owner of anything but an apartment. sorry. i will not knwo the pleasure of see them as a owner of this room.

"hi nice apatment. its a condo. ....No its a condoment."

whats next yorkcreek? condo that place out. everyones been there, its like camp over there....

When we first started the cohousing project, the thing that people said they wanted most was two stories. They would rather it be skinny and tall than have room to spread out. To us, this is what distinguished a place feeling like a house instead of an apartment.

[GRGridGirl]

Now a word about condo converters from the ULI: (talking about Chicago)

"The conversions have the advantage of delivery time and the ability of buyers to see the units. For apartment building owners, the real bang is to sell or convert themselves," Lev added. In today's [national] housing boom or bubble--whatever your take--anything that's not moving is being turned into a condo," said John McIlwain, senior fellow for housing at the Urban Land Institute, a think tank based in Washington, D.C.

"The rental market has been soft and doesn't pay off, so apartment buildings are being sold to condo converters, who have been paying skyrocketing prices. This is happening in strong housing markets, like Chicago," McIlwain said. He maintains that condo conversions serve a different buyer than new condos. "Conversions are for buyers with an immediate need, not for people who can wait two years to move in, like empty-nesters," he said. The move to condos is a long-term trend for the next five to 10 years," McIlwain said. "Boomers and empty-nesters are moving into the city. The pull of city living is very attractive."

-uli.org

Sooo.... you have these great big houses in HH that are already split into apartments, the rental market is flat, your location is prime (close to Downtown, still in a neighborhood), what would you do?

Condos, lofts, flats, live/work studios are NOT terms only reserved for Downtown, Grand Rapids mr. hasno, I mean mrknowitall.

-uw

[GRDadof3]

To each his own. Some people don't like a house with 6 acres, some people do (I don't). Some people like apartment living, and some don't. You don't know whether it's a good investment until you find a like-minded person to buy it from you down the road. Granted, apartment style condos are relatively new in this area, but they have certainly been done thousands of times in other cities. Some people don't want to wait (and can't afford) to buy a condo in Riverhouse, or they want to be in more of a neighborhood. I believe most of these buildings/houses are being renovated before they are sold.

The number of apartments being converted here is WAY lower than what I am seeing in other cities. Even if more of them start popping up.

[GR_Urbanist]

Sooo.... you have these great big houses in HH that are already split into apartments, the rental market is flat, your location is prime (close to Downtown, still in a neighborhood), what would you do?

-uw

This is the thing that I cant figure out. My building was 100% occupied. There were people even moving in after Me and my wife. And yet it is still being condo converted. If the place is almost empty and you cant give units away, then it makes perfect sense to look into other options. But other than making some fast cast from a conversion, I cannot figure the logic of doing it here.

[Nitro]

Saw your frog at Target tonight. I think it was on sale for $27.99.

I chuckled as I walked past it.

Nitro

[Mark Miller]

Condo conversions have become a nationwide phenomenon. Some really great hotels in NYC have and are being converted to condominiums. The Gramercy Hotel and its great little private park are now private residential condos. The Plaza Hotel, with all its great history, has been purchased by an Israeli company and is being converted to high end luxury condos (part of it will still be reserved as a botique hotel).

There is a huge demand for these places in urban areas and if it means we can get people to move into downtowns and we can preserve existing building stock, than it is a good thing, in the short term.

Locally, there are so many examples of condos, including a two-unit on College south of Cherry that was once a single family home. The possibility exists that some duplex units could be converted to condos in the historic neighborhoods as well. There are also examples of retail condominiums, like the Center of the Universe building on Lake Drive. This is just a different form of ownership and again, if it makes a business viable, or brings in a homeowner, then it is a good thing for the city at this point in time.

The other group that the Zimmerman-Volk study indicates that could drive this return to city living is a group called "The Millenials", which is comprised of people just graduating from college all the way down to middle schoolers. This will be a huge demographic which will cause change in real estate. It is already causing changes in car design (the Scion is Toyota's response to this group). The Millenials desire to live in real urban neighborhoods, where they can walk to entertainment and work. They desire a 24 hour city.

The gentrification of neighborhoods due to this condo market is presently a good thing for the city of Grand Rapids. Right now Grand Rapids has an overwhelming affordable housing supply. It is one of the most affordable cities in the nation to live in. When a developer comes in and adds $170, 000 to $300,000 homes to a neighborhood, it is good for EVERYONE in that neighborhood, at least as things stand right now. As someone who lives south of Wealthy, I welcome increased house prices, because it elevates the values of everything in the neighborhood, it also brings more owner occupants into the neighborhood. Currently these neighborhoods to the south of Wealthy have a huge number of rentors, more of a balance would be a good thing for the city as a whole.