ModSquad

InnovaLab would be willing to host a lunch and learn at our modular townhouse project on the 700 Block of Bates if UP folks wanted to learn about modular construction. Just say the word.

In case anyone is interested this link will take you on a virtual 3D walk through of the Genesis/Urbaneer ADU. Genesis/Urbaneer ADU 3D Walkthrough

Strange Coincidence. Genesis was an older line of homes made by Champion. When they decided to launch an ADU line they resurrected the name,

At this year's International Building and Supply Show in Vegas, Champion Homes (our modular manufacturer) made this major ADU announcement. Its a pretty cool partnership between Skyline Champion and Grand Rapids own Urbaneer. We had an actual model on site for folks to tour. The response was overwhelming, albeit mostly from markets on the coast. Primarily Virginia, Bay Area, and Seattle. We are able to bring these in at a price point that is WAY under $200K. The problem is, zoning regulations, and the fact that you have to run separate water and sewer lines to the unit, you cant tie into the water and sewer lines from the house. That is a huge expense. What I would like to see is something very creative like several acres of smaller homes built with this method, kind of like a cottage court. How cool would it be for the City to purchase some of the woefully underutilized dead commercial space along 28th street, clear the site completely and then use it as an area to experiment with creative housing types. It would be a "Zoning Free Zone." I don't know we have to think outside the box.

My Dad always said you can tell a person or organization’s priorities by looking at their check book. In other words you pay for the things that are important to you. In my opinion, aside from the all of the institutional barriers in place to get affordable housing built in GR (a point on which I am in 100% agreement) the City also fails to use their financial ability to support affordable housing.

I started my work in Community Development in this neighborhood in 1995 when we founded Oakdale Neighbors. There is probably not a neighborhood in Grand Rapids I know better than this one. I have to comment on the concerns of gentrification and rising rents because of the Amplify efforts. Amplify has gone to enormous efforts to preserve affordability in this neighborhood. They have purchased existing rentals to guarantee affordable rents once the major development phase comes. Additionally, they have included a certain percentage of their new units will be attainable rent. To top this off they have contributed over $300,000 to help existing home owners do critical repairs and upgrades to their homes. No one is recognizing how this contributes to affordability. Almost all of the development they are planing for is on land that does not include existing homes, so there is no displacement. This then leaves the question of the rise of property values. The Oakdale Park Neighborhood, the last time I looked had about a 55% home ownership rate. Remember, there are a lot of multifamily homes in this neighborhood that were built in the 1920's and 1930's and built as multi family homes. This was very common with dutch immigrants as they would build a duplex. Live in one side and rent the other side to a new family coming over. Additionally, having Adams Park Apts really skews the home ownership rates in the neighborhood. The demographics of their target are is 55% Black, 25% Hispanic, and 20% White. If 80% of the households are Black and Hispanic, and 55% are homeowners then a rise of property values in this neighborhood has the possibility of raising the generational wealth of a LOT of Black and Hispanic families. Due to the Headlee Amendment in Michigan totally minimizes the property tax burden of these homeowner households that will see a sudden rise in property values. I do not hear any complaints about this project from the folks that live there. I do hear complaints from a bunch of "woke" folks that have no stake in the community or its improvement. Their argument does not hold water by any metric

Sorry, I could not resist. Someone sent this to me. Sorry about the NSFW Language. If that breaks some forum rules, please feel free to delete, but this cracked me up.

Yikes! They are asking $825,000 for this building.

On my building on Madison I had an urban clothing shop renting from me for a while. I was committed to not have security bars. After 6 smash and grabs at 3 AM, I gave in and bought swinging gates. During the day you couldn't see them, but when they closed, the owner would swing the gates shut. I think it can be done inconspicuously, but it is a necessity.

I imagine you are right. The labor shortage in the trades is getting pretty bad, I know of several large projects around the State that are dead in the water because the developer literally cannot find builders. Now, if the developer was doing modular, it would be a whole other story (just sayin) Here is two recent examples. The large 4 story is on the old Tiger Stadium site, 110 high end apartments. What you see here was set in 21 days with zero change orders. The smaller project is our townhouse project on the 700 block of Bates. These are attached single family townhouses. We began this set at 8 AM, and what you see on this photo is how the units looked at 5 PM. We set 5 high end homes in one day., 60 days to finish and they hit the market. $150 a sf finished cost, not including land costs. I included the sketch up of the finished product. If anyone wants a tour of the townhouses, let me know.

Dan is also a City if Wyoming Commissioner

Joe, Right now all we have is very technical black and white drawings. Our architect is working on the “pretty pictures” to present to the historic commission up there. When I get them done I’ll post them.

I agree, this is a VERY cool project. InnovaLab has some similar floor plans and elevations in our modular plan book. One is a 4 unit 2 bed apartment development that is being installed in Muskegon and we are now working on refiguring it to install 4-6 more of these units in a historic district south of Flint. Our layout in Flint is very similar to this one. I am going to follow this closely to see how the HPC reacts to the proposal. I have a thought as to how they will react, hope they surprise me...

The studio and 1 bedroom units leased up very fast. They are having a difficult time (and that is being kind) leasing the 2 and 3 bedroom units. The reason for this, I am told, is because of two things. One, it is still under construction and no one wants to move a family into a construction zone. And two, almost none of the promised amenities are in, i.e. work out rooms, dog grooming rooms, promised walking trail by the water, boat docks, etc. If a family is going to move in (2 and 3 bedrooms) they want those things upon arrival.

Hell, I have to drive from Montague to GR. I have to deal with multiple areas of Eastbound 96 from Muskegon to GR under construction just to get to the F’ing gridlock in GR. I have taken to driving through Fremont and Newaygo to ultimately drive Alpine to get to town. You know its bad when Alpine is your clearest route to get into the City.

I can’t resist pointing out (a bit off topic here) that Hibma was the driving force behind the eventual demise of the Kent County Land Bank Authority. He sued the KCLBA all the way to the Michigan Supreme Court and lost, and as we now know eventually got enough votes at the County Commission level to command the County Treasurer to withdraw from the Intergovernmental Agreement which allows the KCLA to exist. His main argument is that the KCLBA was “government interfering in the private sector.” I should point to that Hibma has been buying up land along the Grand River for years between Grand Rapids and the lakeshore. Now he is pressing the government to pay to dredge the river so his land will artificially triple or quadruple in value. Someone please tell me how is this not the government interfering in the private sector? If Hibma wants the river dredged so bad he should pay 100% for the legal work to get the right to do it, and for the work itself. If he lobby’s for and gets even one dime of government funds to pay for this work then he is asking the government to “pick winners and losers,” which is another argument he has used agaisnt the KCLBA.

I wonder how much it cost Redstone Group to submit their application that was just rejected? To a development group as large as this it probably does not matter. But to the point that has been made numerous times on this forum, the small scale developer, new developer, or even individual land owner applying for a zoning variance or special land use permit is completely out of reach knowing a project can get shouted down by Neighbors.

If the Russo’s location is able to be zoned for a dispensary I can only imagine how much a company paid for their building. It’s crazy out there right now. The KCLBA has a two contiguous parcels that it has owned since 2014. We could not give it away, literally. We got a completely legitimate (the company buying it is already licensed with the State) 6 figure offer for it because its “in the zone.” If vacant land is worth that much, how much for a primo location like the Russo site?

As I am working in Cities across the State right now with modular solutions for in-fill development lots I have been asked by numerous developers in those cities to come up with some designs that include attached ADU’s. We are working on a couple of new designs for this right now. Actually, buying a newly constructed home that has an attached 450 -600 SF ADU attached on the rear of the building provides a nice source of revenue for the buyer helping offset their housing costs. It may add $30,000 to the price of their home which would add about $100 to their monthly payment but provide potentially $600 in extra monthly income. We have been talking with a few appraisers to determine how these new homes would be valued. All indications thus far is that if it cost an extra $30,000 to add an ADU it would most likely raise the value of the home by more than that, so the buyer wold have added equity on day one. We will see what comes of it.

...aaaand the Eastown Neghborhood Association has already started an online campaign to stop the ordinance.

Shipping Container Buildings Proposed for Corner of Wealthy and Fuller This will go over like a lead balloon with the Historic Commission.

The answers lay between what is possible and what is practical. Whenever I would communicate to City leadership the need for any changes or modifications to zoning I could alway plan on getting a very long dissertation from Suzanne about why my requested change was not needed because whatever it was I proposed was already possible in GR. Included in her response would be a detailed step by step description of how one would go about getting the type of building approved. The process always includes an application for either a zoning change or usually a special land use permit. The latter being the suggested course of action 90% of the time. If the form of what I would be proposing to build fit within the form based code (or as Suzanne often calls it “form based lite”) but the function did not fit I would be required to submit an application for a Special Land Use. This basically requires me to pay an application fee (I think it’s $1,500) and usually hire an architect to do a site plan and preliminary elevations to show my proposed development. Depending on the size of my project this can cost a pretty penny, architects don’t work for free on spec projects. Once the application goes in then you get on the merry-go-round with the notification to the neighbors of the proposed development. So when Suzanne states in the article that 90% of all applications are approved, instead of coming to the conclusion that there is then no need for a change in zoning, to me the question that should be asked is how many potential projects are never brought forward because our process is either too risky or cumbersome? As it relates to the public outcry from the proposed zoning changes put forward by GR’s HOUSING NOW initiative, from my perspective everything seemed to be moving along fine with the suggested changes which would have allowed more density in traditional neighborhoods to be built by permit. In fact affordable housing groups, non-profits, neighborhood groups, and developers were all around the table developing these ideas. It was not simply a group of developers huddled together making these changes as the neighborhood associations eventually charged. Everything changed, however, when (whether intentional or unintentional) Suzanne at a meeting with a group of neighborhood association leaders chose to use the terminology “Build By Right” when referring to these changes. Let’s be clear they are the same thing. But to a neighborhood association and neighborhood activists, developers having the right to build without a long drawn our community input proceed is grounds for a fight and that’s what we got. I remember quite clearly a battle cry went out on social media literally during the meeting with Suzanne, Suzanne is 100% correct in that article. But to me it’s a matter of semantics it “can” get approved and developed, but will it in the current system?

Unfortunately that’s exactly what is going to happen.

I have it on pretty good authority that it has something to do with a Bitcoin fraud. Not sure if it was the folks from GG themselves or someone using their facility and equipment. A lot of computers were seized.

I could spend hours replying to everyone’s comments here. And I really do not want to rehash the same old arguments. This will be my last comment on the KCLBA The Kent County Land Bank Authority was authorized through the execution of an Intergovernmental Agreement. This agreement authorizes the County Treasurer to partner with the State of Michigan Land Bank Authority to launch the Kent County Land Bank Authority. The legislation is crystal clear about the make up of the Board of Directors. It is the County Treasurer as Chair, a County Commissioner, an elected official from Grand Rapids, one other City elected official, and a Township elected official. The legal status of a County Land Bank is a “Corporate Body Public” meaning it is basically a corporation owned by the government. The “government” according to the IGA is the Michigan Land Bank Authority and the County Treasurer. The legal structure is also very clear that this Board of Directors is responsible for all aspects related to running the organization and lays out its basic duties. My point here is that the County has absolutely no say in how their land bank operates. In light of this the County Commission recommends that the KCLBA not get involved in the development of affordable housing...seriously? The KCLBA is a vital tool in creating more affordable housing but the County Commission tells the board to stop this activity. Who in their right mind instructs this with the housing crisis facing our region? Important to note that the legal structure of a land bank is the same as the Convention Authority, the Airport Authority, and even the Convention Authority. Can you imagine if the County Commission started messing with the Airport Authority or Convention Authority? Speaking of “Mission Creep” why doesn’t the County Commission question why the Convention Authority is looking at building a 400 room hotel? How is this not competing with the private sector? In regard to tax foreclosures, the KCLBA only took in tax foreclosures upon request for a partnership with a local unit of government by them exercising their legal right of first refusal. This is the reason land banks were set up. It is in the legislation that partnering with a “land bank to acquire, clear title of, and dispose of real estate is a valid public purpose.” In regard to the 5/50 tax payment, a large number of projects for which the KCLBA collected these 50% tax payments for were new construction on vacant lots or redevelopment of homes that had little to no taxable value. When the projects were done through partnership with the KCLBA the increased taxable value was exponential. Additionally, if you read the Michigan State study done of our work it showed signifintly increased property values of homes sold in the neighborhoods around land bank projects. They even went so far as to calculate how these homes around our projects sold at prices higher than the market, so it took into consideration market conditions thus eliminating the arguement that this would have happened with out our intervention. Last, the County Commission refused to intervene with the County Sherrif’s Execution of a contract with ICE for detaining folks they arrest. The reason the County Commission gave was that te Sherrif is an elected official and it is not right for the Commission to tell an elected official what to do. Yet since the inception of the KCLBA the Commission has intervened and inserted itself in the operations and the decisions of the County Commissioner. In fact, in an unprecedented move, the County Commission did not speak with their representative on the KCLBA Board, or the County Commissioner to let them know this vote was coming. Then they broke their standing rules to rush it through Committee to a vote on the next meeting. Additionally, in both meetings when County Commissioners had questions for the County Treasurer about the actions he was not allowed to speak or answer the questions. He was relegated to a 3 min comment like anyone else. I have never seen an elected official treated so poorly in my life. Last, Chair Saalfeld has stated over and over and over that the KCLBA was formed only to deal with blight. Frankly this is simply not true. It is a straight forward motion to authorize the County Treasurer to enter into the IGA with the State land bank to operate with all the authority and actions granted a land bank in the State of Michigan. No one can convince me that this was nothing but pure lane duck BS politics with no regard to the legal structure of the organization, its partnerships with local units of government throughout Kent County. I am done, and will not speak on this issue again. Goodnight.