NYtoCLT
-
Posts
184 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Gallery
Project Database
User Guide
Store
Events
Posts posted by NYtoCLT
-
-
https://www.multihousingnews.com/alliance-residential-carlyle-open-luxury-charlotte-community/
Some interesting info/data/anecdotes here. Charlotte barely cracked the top 20 for 2024 Office to Apartment Pipeline.
-
1
-
-
- Popular Post
- Popular Post
I just got back from CREFC (the largest commercial real estate finance conference of the year) and there was a panel on conversions of distressed office to multi-family that was pretty interesting. There wasn't an existing thread so I thought I would create one, since there will likely be specific developments as well as policy changes in CLT dealing with this in the coming years.
I went without much prior thought on conversions though had previously heard from some people that conversions can cost more than just tearing down and re-building from scratch. That said, I walked away pretty bullish on conversions. Some of the main take-aways.
1. Right now supply of multi-family is ~2% conversions but is projected to be ~10% in the coming years. Right now Office to Resi only accounts for ~1/3 of conversions (fair bit of industrial to resi -- i.e. mill apartments, and hotel to resi).
2. The cost and time to assess whether an office building is a good candidate to convert has decreased dramatically. It used to take 6 months and $200,000 just to figure out that conversion didn't pencil. Now it takes a couple of days and is a de minimis cost. The major architecture firms have software that evaluates the floor plans and spits out a calculation of the likelihood of success of the conversion project.
3. For people in development, some of the biggest concerns are delays and cost overruns. The trades most likely to cause delays and cost overruns line up pretty much exactly with the trades that are not needed for a conversion (foundation, etc). This takes away a fair bit of the construction risk and makes timelines easier to hit.
3. Most people know that as a positive, converting an empty office to apartments would revitalize the area (more people to shop at the retail nearby, etc). And for people concerned about housing supply and the cost of housing, this would obviously help that as well. What I didn't fully appreciate and I don't think is talked about much is the level of environmental impact. Concrete is one of the most carbon intensive processes out there and by not having to pour new concrete and being able to re-use existing metal, a conversion is more green than building a new building even if no other environmental considerations are taken into account and the equivalent new construction is LEED Platinum (or whatever).
4. The Biden Admin is working with some of the agencies to make a pool of cheap money available for these conversions, but processes are still unclear and the money is not yet easily accessible.
5. Most municipalities are having discussions about tax incentives, but the level to which incentives will be used will be hyper local. Hopefully CLT takes some lead on this since we definitely have a fair bit of Class B office in uptown that could cause problems.
-
8
-
6
-
4 hours ago, CLT Development said:
They haven't gotten inspected since May 31st, which they passed, which was for water sealing spaces, on May 30th they failed an inspection for framing.
She's cute tho. Would gladly take 50 more of her.
Would have been a great addition of missing middle directly on a (semi) protected bike lane. Contrast that with abandoned structure currently being used as a homeless encampment and it's a pretty hard 180.
-
On 2/7/2022 at 3:01 PM, buildleft said:
This project includes 10 townhomes and 12 units above 3k sf retail. Great project imo and we need a lot more like it
Based on the lack of progress over the past 6-9 months and the homeless people camped out, this project looks dead (or at least stalled). Sad considering how far construction got before it died. Maybe with interest rates decreasing the project will be able to pencil again (and hopefully sitting idle for 6 months will not have done irreparable damage).
-
3
-
-
2 hours ago, CLT Development said:
That makes sense! I haven't seen these under construction! Thank you.
They're pretty far along at this point.
-
2
-
-
I really hope this comes to fruition. With some of the other developments around this area like The Joinery there is a real pedestrian prioritized focus. That plus the density that is going up all down the light rail from Optimist Park through Noda, this stretch has so much potential.
-
4
-
-
Has CMS made any statements about when they expect to break ground on any of these projects? Is this the kind of thing where nothing will happens for years or do people expect movement pretty quickly?
-
1
-
-
40 minutes ago, MothBeast said:
I thought this was Villa Heights or at least according to the Mill District branding. I do see that google maps labels it as Optimist Park though. And then most people call it NoDa. I wonder what people will call the strip of urbanity bordered by Brevard, Parkwood, Davidson/Yadkin and Matheson in 5 years. I’ve been thinking of it as the burgeoning Downtown Villa Heights. I generally think that definitions of neighborhoods in this area are bound to change. For example what we call NoDa was never going to orient itself entirely around North Davidson street, the developable area is too long and narrow to maintain a consistent character and sense of place. There are also many physical barriers that create neighborhood boundaries of their own. Now the axis for “NoDa” seems to be 36th street extending to the other side to North Tryon, while a new neighborhood has been forming in what I call Downtown Villa Heights. Meanwhile their is a bubble of development I’ve taken to calling Optimist Park that takes up much of the old neighborhood and has started to spread across the tracks with Optimist Hall as it’s center. These all feel like distinct places to me, and I’ve started considering the area around Sugar Creek station to be its own neighborhood as well called Sugar Creek. Neighborhoods are in the eye of the beholder, but I feel there is a case due to geography for their to be 4 distinct neighborhoods within the area many refer to as just “NoDa”.
This has been my TedTalk
I think Parkwood/Plaza/Mattheson is Villa Heights. Surprised to see this branded as Optimist Park since I don't think there is any more cache in that then Villa Heights tbh. I'm surprised they didn't try to sell it as NODA like everyone else who is even somewhat near NODA.
-
Has anyone heard any updates about the Hotel planned on Central and Hawthorne? I feel like this would be huge for the neighborhood.
-
25 minutes ago, CLT Development said:
It was replaced with a Multifamily building though... there's still a project moving forward on this site.
Any idea if they are planning for ground floor retail? Any sense of # of units?
-
2 hours ago, SydneyCarton said:
More buildings in Elizabeth torn down as plans for hotel rezoning are withdrawn
Gordon RagoThu, July 6, 2023 at 6:10 AM EDT·2 min readThe Elizabeth neighborhood won’t be getting a hotel — at least not for now.
Meanwhile, two buildings that were on the site for the planned hotel are slated for demolition. Crews were in the process of tearing one down last week. Another building badly damaged in a November fire is also slated for demolition, according to county property records.
The demolitions come months after Durham-based developer Lucrum Seven withdrew its plans to rezone a corner lot in the Charlotte neighborhood for a a six-story hotel and retail. The property sits at the corner of Lamar Avenue and East 7th Street.
Too bad they pulled out. A hotel would honestly be pretty great there. Neighbors are going to complain no matter what in Elizabeth but it's probably the (realistic) use that would upset the fewest people. God knows apartments would cause an uproar (and no one is building office).
-
2
-
-
1 hour ago, Blue_Devil said:
McDowell street is direct access to 2nd ward and Brooklyn village from here, with the new medschool in between
Yea, I thought about this too. TBD with all the construction. Maybe after all the road work finishes this stretch will be more welcoming (and maybe breathe some semblance of life into Marshall Park (while it is still there).
-
1
-
-
3 hours ago, DownEast said:
Wow. Such intense density instantly rising here. I expect the neighborhood to stiffen up a bit and hold development to the the Morehead front. All this development in stark contrast to 2nd Ward has me feeling it will jump the highway soon, jumpstart Brooklyn Village or some other manifestation. But, I'm loving Morehead from Mint to the Greenway right now.
No real accessibility between this part of Moorehead and Second Ward. South Blvd. is a pedestrian dead zone even if you could get to it so it really only opens up at Tryon. It will be interesting to see how Moorehead looks when all is said and done though -- going to be pretty stark contrast to most of Dilworth right behind it.
-
1
-
-
3 hours ago, Hushpuppy321 said:
Cool indeed - NODA Express!
I picked up pizza from Figo36 and stopped to gawk. This is a really cool corporate event space.
-
3
-
-
15 hours ago, kermit said:
^ ok, I get that. But relative to a run the mill HOA the PITA factor of historic districts seems relatively trivial. I am guessing that 70% of SFH in Charlotte are in an HOA, why are we picking on historic districts while ignoring the problematic nature of HOAs. At least historic districts strive to maintain actual neighborhood character rather than some vague 1990s low-cost, auto- centric, aesthetic.
If we decide to ignore the creation and continued maintenance of HOAs in the city, why do we feel like its fine to call out historic districts as problematic for supply restrictions? Seems like another suburban-privilege double standard.
As far as HOAs, I actually could see this discussion broadened to encompass HOAs in ~10-15 years, but the most close in neighborhoods generally do not have HOAs and those are the areas where the push for way more dense, walkable housing is being pushed for most aggressively. It would not surprise me if eventually people want to put a couple of townhomes in a random suburban HOA though if prices continue to rise.
As far as restricting supply, the Dilworth historic district basically took effect because people were mad about ugly townhomes in their neighborhood and it has done a pretty good job of preventing more of the same or similar. If you were going to try to turn 2 home lots into 5 townhomes (or whatever), historic district designation makes it so you will almost certainly look elsewhere because your money has to sit patiently while it could be getting returns elsewhere. Historic districts cut against the (I think laudable) goals of the UDO.
-
1
-
1
-
-
On 5/13/2023 at 11:29 AM, kermit said:
^ is he really suggesting that Elizabeth and Dilworth will magically become bastions of affordability without historic district status? (Or that Elizabeth is somehow different than Dilworth in anyway other than historic district status?)
Elizabeth has gotten a lot more expensive recently, but it is still consistently ~$200K less for the same house compared to Dilworth. Historic District designation restricts supply which definitely impacts prices but my guess is more in the aggregate and less per neighborhood. Dilworth isn't getting materially less expensive even if it revoked historic status.
-
1
-
-
- Popular Post
- Popular Post
On 5/11/2023 at 9:58 PM, ertley said:To me, the most exciting thing about this is that it basically borders North Tryon on its western corner, which means it along with the new apartment block south by Brookshire, and then the complex going in directly across the tracks from Optimist Hall, which will be formally approached (by car) from North Tryon, that super sad stretch of North Tryon might actually be made into some place...habitable. I never would have dreamed it just a few years ago.
Optimist Hall has clearly been a huge catalyst for the apartment boom right around it and Birdsong, but if it expands to North Tryon that is legitimately unbelievable. Cleaning up that stretch of North Tryon is necessary for rehabilitating parts of 1st Ward and 4th Ward (which is needed for Uptown).
-
5
-
17 hours ago, CLT Development said:
Nope, I have NO idea what is up with that parcel, this is inside the neighborhood more. This is the parcel
Interesting. The entire stretch from Optimist through NODA along the blue line feels like it is going to rival the density of South End in no time.
-
24 minutes ago, CLT Development said:
Behind Joinery Phase 2 and around Starlight
The (mostly vacant) parcel on Davidson north of 22 overlooking Cordelia Park? Great location.
-
3 hours ago, CLT Development said:
Spacecraft snapped up another 1.6 acres for 290 units and 17K retail. Wild. They are up to like biblical amounts of residential units and 120,000 sq feet of retail.
Location?
-
8 hours ago, CLT Development said:
Yea agreed, the food is really bad, so are the drinks. Everything else is impeccable, and I've been talking about their attention to families for months, they were really really smart to do that. I'm excited for the market, the soju brewery, the ice cream spot under the bridge and to see the entire area explode. Once I hear about one of the stalls actually being good (I have about 8 reviews from friends ranging from passable to atrocious), I'll come try one.
A full steak place seems like a weird thing for a food hall, but honestly the steak looked decent (the burger and chicken sandwich...weren't).
-
1
-
-
It has an outdoor playground plus splash pad. Plus inside the UDM there is a corner that is an in-door play area with play kitchen, toys, etc.
25 minutes ago, Madison Parkitect said:What do they have for kids? We take ours to Optimist Hall sometimes but there's nothing there specifically for them. Does UDM have a playground or anything like that?
-
2
-
2
-
-
23 hours ago, CLT Development said:
Nope, its all out of one kitchen controlled by Seoul Food. You can look at a few of the "kitchens" behind the food stalls and see that it all connects to the same commissary. It is nothing like Optimist Hall. I toured it a few times while it was under construction. There are some flat tops, conveyor ovens and pieces of cooking equipment facing outward but for the most part its connected.
You assumed correctly.
The food is not very good at Seoul or at any of the UDM spots (tried a couple), but if you have kids it is basically paradise for them so a good place to grab a beer and let the kids go nuts. It looked like the second half of UDM will eventually open a coffee shop that isnt open yet. That will hopefully be a good addition.
For all the urbanists on here, it is a pretty perfect location to bike to.
-
56 minutes ago, Hushpuppy321 said:
Just went by UDM today and it was absolutely jumping with people. Definitely going to be a hit - Very much a compliment to Optimist Food Hall.
I biked by today and it was crazy., If you have kids it is going to be one of the most popular places in the summer.
-
4
-
Optimist Park / Belmont Projects
in Charlotte
Posted
Maybe if this gets completed/is successful it was reviatlize the stalled development on Parkwood and Allen a couple of blocks away (and maybe the couple of developments that look stalled on Belmont Ave.).