DENVER | Main Development Thread #7

[gopokes21]

I would hate to see TakeFive or anyone banned. I'm actually pleasantly surprised by some of the vigorous discussions here.

I just don't care about AZ. Maybe that's a personal problem as someone who already fled TX. Like ew.

But this should really just be development news and discussion for the highest and bestest city in the nation.

[bunt_q]

Nevermind...

[TakeFive]

Reset - Refresh - Reinvest - Renew - Rinse - Repeat

https://www.bizjournals.com/denver/n...on-street.html

Asana Partners, the North Carolina-based real estate firm that last year purchased Larimer Square for $92 million, is continuing to grow its Denver property holdings in another well-known retail district.

In early January, Asana paid $2.66 million for a single-story, 5,634-square-foot retail property at 3955 N. Tennyson St, according to property records.

Source

The company followed that purchase with the recent acquisition of the first-floor commercial unit of the Streetcar Lofts condominium building, located at 4144 N. Tennyson St., for $1.73 million, records show.

Photo courtesy Thomas Gounley - BusinessDen

In June 2019, Asana paid $1.8 million for the restaurant building at 4000 N. Tennyson St., home to Post Oak Barbecue

Source

In September 2019, the company purchased a building that includes two retail units at 3926 and 3930 N. Tennyson St. for $1.74 million.

Source

In early March 2020, the company acquired the property at 3963 N. Tennyson St. for $1.3 million.

Source

[SirLucasTheGreat]

.Denver City Council approves update to group living rules

https://www.9news.com/article/news/l...f-debb846376ea

[Robert.hampton]

Hey so can anyone riddle me how Denver's home prices are up 18% YoY alongside one of the highest unemployment rates in the country? Has covid made the unemployment numbers irrelevant since everyone moving to Denver is coming in from a white collar job in NYC and SF and thus aren't counted in Colorado's unemployment numbers? Whats going on?!!

[twister244]

Originally Posted by Robert.hampton

Hey so can anyone riddle me how Denver's home prices are up 18% YoY alongside one of the highest unemployment rates in the country? Has covid made the unemployment numbers irrelevant since everyone moving to Denver is coming in from a white collar job in NYC and SF and thus aren't counted in Colorado's unemployment numbers? Whats going on?!!

I think it might be a combination of several factors. Mortgage rates have been so low that folks are jumping on buying property if they have the means. It's interesting to note that rent in Denver hasn't gone up much at all over the last year, so maybe what's happening in addition to people moving here, is renters are graduating to buying homes now.

Supply..... We just aren't building housing fast enough here. This is anecdotal, in the Jefferson Park and Sloan's Lake area, but the amount of land available to build more "slot" homes and townhomes is quickly dwindling in these areas. My immediate neighborhood in Jefferson Park doesn't have much room left.... I suspect this is happening all over the city as we have built so much over the last 10 years. The other problem is there are large swaths of the city that never got upzoned last time around. I mentioned Jefferson Park and Sloan's lake (south of 20th, north of Colfax). As soon as you get north of 20th and west of Federal, nothing has changed as those houses can't be touched.


You combine this with (as you mentioned) folks moving in from more expensive coastal locations, and well, you have what's going on now. This is why I advocated for massive upzoning in Denver to help get the ball rolling on allowing more construction in other areas.

Oh, and it doesn't help that Denver's immediate neighbor to the west (Lakewood) now imposes a cap on new housing construction in a bid to become the next Golden and Boulder. Some of that pressure to buy new construction has probably spilled over into western Denver now.

[gopokes21]

High unemployment in Denver is the accumulated effect of consistently erring on the side of Covid caution for a whole year now. I think our Covid depression has been worse than others, although exactly like everyone said it's only relevant for the service sector and barely even touches our professional sector. Before the pandemic Denver actually ranked first nationally with work-from-home employees and I can't imagine that would change much.

CO ranks 1st among states, Denver 1st among MSAs, for remote working according to the Census
https://www.bizjournals.com/denver/n...from-home.html

That said I expect Denver, having consistently had lower Covid numbers, to have an earlier and stronger recovery than other places with more lingering case volume.

Originally Posted by twister244

I think it might be a combination of several factors. Mortgage rates have been so low that folks are jumping on buying property if they have the means. It's interesting to note that rent in Denver hasn't gone up much at all over the last year, so maybe what's happening in addition to people moving here, is renters are graduating to buying homes now.

Supply..... We just aren't building housing fast enough here. This is anecdotal, in the Jefferson Park and Sloan's Lake area, but the amount of land available to build more "slot" homes and townhomes is quickly dwindling in these areas. My immediate neighborhood in Jefferson Park doesn't have much room left.... I suspect this is happening all over the city as we have built so much over the last 10 years. The other problem is there are large swaths of the city that never got upzoned last time around. I mentioned Jefferson Park and Sloan's lake (south of 20th, north of Colfax). As soon as you get north of 20th and west of Federal, nothing has changed as those houses can't be touched.

What's interesting is for-sale product keeps appreciating at a skyrocketing (alarming?) rate, but rents have actually been down by almost 10% across the city. Rental and for-sale product are exhibiting completely opposite trends. Further, the for-sale market places a significant premium on a Denver address; the rental market did the same until recently except now Denver rents have dropped more than suburbs.

The long-term money still wants to be in Denver whereas more mobile people are vacilating between downtown and burbs, which makes sense as 2020 life is definitely better in the burbs and most of Denver's selling points have been temporarily reduced.

The market is behaving like 2020 will be a fluke. In my neck of the woods, Cheesman/Congress Park - we're still being overran with scrape-and-build homes (huge awful shame IMO) on every block and the commercial corridors are all either a construction mess or a predevelopment mess. I think East Central (Santa Fe to Monaco-ish?) grows by at least another 25,000 people this next decade (the market area has already gone from 125,000 to 150,000 over the last 10 years).

We need citywide upzoning, more deliberate historic preservation targeting, affordable housing to mitigate displacement, better planning to enable more growth, and (not to beat a dead horse, but...) more infrastructure. The answer is more of everything not just any one thing.

[The Dirt]

Luckily, now that group living passed, Denver's version of Portland's RIP (Residential Infill Project) will kick off this summer. Unluckily, this will likely be a 3 year process. The hope is that all SU (single family zoning), an unfortunate vestige of redlining and race-based zoning, is eliminated. I'd love to see SU, TU, and even RH zoning removed and replaced with at least MU-3. This will allow for the form in our so-called form based zoning to take a bigger role.

[TakeFive]

Speaking of Tennyson Street - Scroll Up

Conundrum meets Perfect Storm

Originally Posted by Robert.hampton

Hey so can anyone riddle me how Denver's home prices are up 18% YoY alongside one of the highest unemployment rates in the country? Has covid made the unemployment numbers irrelevant since everyone moving to Denver is coming in from a white collar job in NYC and SF and thus aren't counted in Colorado's unemployment numbers? Whats going on?!!

Things we know

• The Apartment market is on the soft side. While rents are generally flat YoY, the more recent trend in rents is downward. The typical incentive being offered is 3 weeks free rent.
• The market for condo sales in central Denver is on the slow side.
• Millennials are now age 25 to 38
• According to Realtor.com:

  The median listing price of land in Denver is $482700.

"Money in my pocket" - Who's got it?

• Millennials - many have now been in Denver 5 years or more; their incomes have grown as have their savings
• Tech Bros - With Denver's tech footprint growing you have more people making more money up and down the food chain.
• Don't discount the Stock Market. It's been on a roll of ever higher highs and many millennials have become investors. Chances are, so are their parents

Conundrum Whiplash
When Covid hit nobody wanted to either sell or buy a home. Ninety days later, everybody that didn't already own decided they wanted to buy (only) a Single Family Home. To a lesser degree builders suffered from the same whiplash. Talk about a Perfect Storm.

Building moratoriums
are not a real issue; apartment projects are not what's needed. It's finding single-family or townhome land since that's where the demand is.

Up-zoning
is not the biggest issue. If you think the costs of construction are high... try penciling the costs of redevelopment. If affordable is what you seek, good luck.

Builders are not building enough new homes, even for those who are willing to drive. I suspect it's coming but new developments take time to get going.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

Speaking of Tennyson Street - Scroll Up

Building moratoriums
are not a real issue; apartment projects are not what's needed. It's finding single-family or townhome land since that's where the demand is.

Up-zoning
is not the biggest issue. If you think the costs of construction are high... try penciling the costs of redevelopment. If affordable is what you seek, good luck.

Builders are not building enough new homes, even for those who are willing to drive. I suspect it's coming but new developments take time to get going.

What do you propose as an alternative?

[jhwk]

RTD board meeting is happening right now - Polis has entered the discussion and made it clear that it is the B-line or nothing for RTD’s future plans as long as he is governor.

It sounds like at least some of the RTD board is supportive of paying for a new engineering study. I think it is important that if a new study is done, the decision to use DMU technology and 30 minute frequency is revisited. Electrification and 15-minute frequency is needed.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

What do you propose as an alternative?

Aurora.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by jhwk

RTD board meeting is happening right now - Polis has entered the discussion and made it clear that it is the B-line or nothing for RTD’s future plans as long as he is governor.

It sounds like at least some of the RTD board is supportive of paying for a new engineering study. I think it is important that if a new study is done, the decision to use DMU technology and 30 minute frequency is revisited. Electrification and 15-minute frequency is needed.

Best news for future automated- and electric- single occupant vehicles all week. By the time the Boulder contingent lifts their stranglehold on RTD, there will no longer be any need or desire for RTD regional rail.

[SirLucasTheGreat]

IT does not get talked about enough but the Flatiron Flyer is a fairly large reason why the Northwest rail extension does not make much sense. I would love to see the rail system built but the Flatiron Flyer is a more convenient service. It is faster and goes to more desirable locations. The B Line would not service the CU campus or Pearl St. in Boulder, as opposed to the Flatiron Flyer. If we could build rail at costs comparable to Europe or Asia, then great but that is not the scenario that we find ourselves in.

[Utah_Dave]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

Waste Not, Want Not


There are also creatively good ways of handling helicopter money.

Voila
https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/co...covid-19-cash1

Off topic - but company required payments for the unemployment insurance fund is where Arizona has a Big competitive advantage over Colorado. AZ is rated 13th (Texas is rated 18th) most favorable to businesses while Colorado is rated 40th. See cool map HERE.

BTW, I recently drove AZ's new Diverging Diamond Interchange. I see where CDOT built one of these in the metro area with the McCaslin Bridge over U.S. 36 at the Louisville-Superior exit. It was really weird at first. As I drove the interchange from all directions I began to get a feel and why it made sense, why they build these gems.

Sorry to interrupt but I do enjoy reading other mountain west forums and I had to comment on the diverging triangle intersection. We have several of these intersections along the Wasatch front and I’m not a fan overall of their use. I think the single point intersection is probably the most versatile intersection, particularly when you have additional stop light controlled intersection close to the major intersection in question. The biggest failure of this type of intersection is in the SLC area where the 201 freeway on the west side of the valley interacts with bangeter highway. If you look it up on a map you will see there is a frontage road that bulges south to create a little distance from the diverging Diamond but it’s still way to close and that new intersection and its constantly backed up, particularly before Covid reduced traffic congestion in the area. The single point intersection would be far superior here. There are some situations I may use it depending on which way the heavy traffic flows but this intersection is too cute.

Just thought I would share with a group of people who might care more then most! Lol

[TakeFive]

Use a shotgun approach (No, we're not talking Ozark on Netflix)

Originally Posted by The Dirt

What do you propose as an alternative?

I have to believe that condos bigger than a matchbox and/or townhomes could be popular if included in the various mixed-use developments.

Examples:

Gates/Broadway Station:

Texas-based Endeavor Real Estate Group and Denver-based Legend Partners have unveiled the name and initial plans for a huge transit-oriented, mixed-use development at Denver’s Broadway Station that will pay homage to the recently-demolished Gates Rubber Factory

This was scheduled to break ground a year ago.

Denver’s Elyria-Swansea getting 700-home development

The new development will include affordable housing and a venue

On Monday night, the Denver City Council approved a rezoning that would allow one of the neighborhood’s first major development proposals. A husband-and-wife development team wants to build about 700 homes and other features on a former call-center site at 2535 East 40th Ave.

That article is from May 7, 2019; what's going on with this project.

This property was purchased in July of 2018


Photo courtesy Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite

What’s new at Loretto Heights?

Westside submitted a rezoning application on Jan. 25, which will be heard by the city’s planning board in March. If the board OKs the application, it will set in a motion a process Westside hopes will conclude with Denver City Council approving the rezoning in May.

SUN VALLEY ECODISTRICT MASTER PLAN


Image courtesy Shears Adkins Rockmore

Stadium District Master Plan


City of Denver

TAVA Waters


Image courtesy Koelbel and Company

New Townhome Community to Break Ground at TAVA Waters
January 27, 2021

Pre-sales began today for Prelude at TAVA Waters, Koelbel and Company‘s new townhome community on the site of TAVA Waters, formerly the iconic Breakers Resort Property.

Prelude at TAVA Waters will feature three distinct floorplans ranging in size from 1,200 to 2,100 square feet, and offering two and three bedrooms... Pricing starts at $465,000.

Old CDOT headquarters turned to rubble, new residential and retail development planned
Posted Jul 02, 2019, what's going on with this project?


Source

TOD
Up-zone the land adjacent to Yale Station; most of the initial re-zoning should be in Unincorporated Arapahoe County. Tremendous potential at this station.

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Aurora.

I guess we could go there next if you're really dying to know?

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by Utah_Dave

Sorry to interrupt but I do enjoy reading other mountain west forums and I had to comment on the diverging triangle intersection. We have several of these intersections along the Wasatch front and I’m not a fan overall of their use. I think the single point intersection is probably the most versatile intersection, particularly when you have additional stop light controlled intersection close to the major intersection in question. The biggest failure of this type of intersection is in the SLC area where the 201 freeway on the west side of the valley interacts with bangeter highway. If you look it up on a map you will see there is a frontage road that bulges south to create a little distance from the diverging Diamond but it’s still way to close and that new intersection and its constantly backed up, particularly before Covid reduced traffic congestion in the area. The single point intersection would be far superior here. There are some situations I may use it depending on which way the heavy traffic flows but this intersection is too cute.

Just thought I would share with a group of people who might care more then most! Lol

I think I found it. I'll take your word for it.

The DDI I'm referring to is a busy cross street (Happy Valley Rd) intersection with I-17. A dozen years ago they put in a Roundabout which was bizarro. That said a lot of growth has occurred since then with most of the density on the east side with a lot more growth ahead. There is a frontage road on the east side. No question the DDI is waaaay better than that Roundabout.

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by jhwk

RTD board meeting is happening right now - Polis has entered the discussion and made it clear that it is the B-line or nothing for RTD’s future plans as long as he is governor.

It sounds like at least some of the RTD board is supportive of paying for a new engineering study. I think it is important that if a new study is done, the decision to use DMU technology and 30 minute frequency is revisited. Electrification and 15-minute frequency is needed.

So go from a bronze-plated boondoogle to a gold-plated boondoogle? Great.

I think that Polis needs to have the B-Line hung around his neck sot that when RTD further cuts urban bus routes to pay for this little vanity project he can take ownership of the implicit discrimination against black and brown folks so that white folks can have their choo-choo.

Man, f**k Boulder. If there was ever a city in Colorado that needed a low-level nuke to clear out the offal it's that collection of sanctimonious righteousness. This is the Boulder municipal utility push all over again.


*Now Longmont is getting the shaft on the NW Line (as are all the folks who were supposed to get additional bus service as part of FasTracks, but that's not talked about anymore)... I do feel like something should be done on that front, but really it should be coupled with a push for Front Range Rail.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Aurora.

This makes more sense than anything he's posted. Funny how long winded he is yet, when asked a direct question, can't when make a bit of sense. Probably dementia.

PS: As someone who's from Boulder, I also say fuck Boulder and their choo choo. (I love choo choos)

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

This makes more sense than anything he's posted. Funny how long winded he is yet, when asked a direct question, can't when make a bit of sense. Probably dementia.

'My dementia' is just one of those things that comes and goes. When it comes, I just go sit in a chair and mumble for awhile. When it goes, I grab my 'thinking cap' and 'get to work.'

Let me clarify what you are saying since I'm a terrible mind reader. Since you are responding to bunt are you actually saying that it is Aurora that is best positioned to solve Denver's housing costs problem? If so, I'd agree this makes a lot of sense.

Originally Posted by jhwk

It sounds like at least some of the RTD board is supportive of paying for a new engineering study. I think it is important that if a new study is done, the decision to use DMU technology and 30 minute frequency is revisited. Electrification and 15-minute frequency is needed.

In order to use EMU's along with having nice frequency would require RTD to have their own Right-of-Way, which is a Fine Idea (that I have previously suggested).

But if RTD needs to rent time/space on Burlington-Northern's tracks then that dog won't hunt.

Originally Posted by wong21fr

So go from a bronze-plated boondoogle to a gold-plated boondoogle? Great.

I think that Polis needs to have the B-Line hung around his neck sot that when RTD further cuts urban bus routes to pay for this little vanity project he can take ownership of the implicit discrimination against black and brown folks so that white folks can have their choo-choo.

I had been thinking that Polis was just playing softball by wanting to show the home-towners he was thinking of them. But it looks like he actually wants to play hardball.

The biggest problem with the B Line were costs. First and foremost it was the projected high costs that Burlington-Northern wanted to share their tracks with RTD. Now if RTD were to be gifted the Right-of-Way to build the B Line that would be HUGE. Since we're talking about Boulder County (primarily) let the esteemed Governor take responsibility for finding/acquiring the needed Right-of-Way.

The next challenge would be whether the ridership projections would be enough to secure coveted FTA grants. If not then RTD would be building the B Line wholly on their own dime.