urbanMSP

Misleading headline, since 90% of the story is about the calculation of vacancy rates. However the 2nd paragraph in has an interesting estimate on the number of new apartments coming online in the coming years:

"Brent Wittenberg, vice president at Marquette Advisors, a real-estate consulting company, says developers added 1,100 apartments downtown in 2013 and 900 in 2014. He expects another 1,080 this year and 560 more in 2016. Some 2,000 are proposed for the following year, although it’s likely that some will never break ground, he says.

http://www.minnpost.com/business/2015/0 ... apartments

Depends what they define as "downtown", I'm sure. I don't have the figures handy at the moment but I'd think North Loop alone has seen that much activity, much less the CBD, Loring Park, Elliot Park, the Mills District, etc.

The developers saying apartments are getting built because there isn't a supply of buyers wanting investment real estate like other destination cities.

Also, lawsuits. Even if developers want to, architects stay away if asked.

http://www.minnpost.com/politics-policy ... ign=buffer

It seems the lawsuits only affect developers who build a half-assed product, and the reason why Shamrock is one of the few who will put enough quality into their buildings. That's what I took away from the article and the comments.

Which other states have similar liability requirements? What are those markets' lawsuit rates?

But the point stands that builders could choose to not build minimum construction. The old snark that building to code is building to the lowest allowed standard.

One defect gets every condo owner suing the developer. An apartment owner can work constructively with the developer rather than immediately turning too expensive litigation with dozens of parties. Latin American tycoons with a fifteen Miami condos don't care about defects like Bob from Eden Prairie who staked his retirement in a Mill District condo.

Went to the thing Callaghan is talking about in the article, and he mentions it briefly, but one thing they talked about that I haven't heard a ton about is Minnesotans specifically spending a lot of their property budgets on outside properties, and how that impacts the condo market in Minneapolis. If the $1,000,000 units really subsidize the $300,000 units that much, I suppose quite a bit of the cabin real estate market (not to mention Florida, etc) is eating up capital that might be spent on a pricier condo. I know older people who could, in theory, blow $800,000 on a condo downtown, but instead have a cabin or a Sunbelt vacation property and rent downtown.

I always assumed that other states and markets had similar rates of vacation property ownership as Minnesota - but maybe that's something uniquely a part of our culture. Even middle income families seem to be all over having vacation property up north (I've even been thinking about buying some land as an UrbanMSP Northern Retreat).

Some quick googlesleuthing found this: http://eyeonhousing.org/2011/08/where-a ... ond-homes/

Looks like northern MN, WI, and MI are relatively unique in how many homes are classified as second homes, though the Northeast is pretty similar. Southern states also have a large absolute number but, but those are almost all retirement homes for snowbirds (again, I'd guess residents from cold places like MN/WI/MI/NY/etc are well-represented).

Any opinions/speculation on how our unusually mild winter weather has/will affect the construction boom? I'd think/hope it'll prolong it by helping the economy and allowing more construction to take place (freeing up labor for more projects and lowering costs). I'm not sure how helpful it would be compared to a normal winter.

Fun anecdote of mixed value here: the Eitel building in Loring Park was sold by Village Green to Excelsior Group this week, which I don't remember seeing in the news. Other than this costing me several thousand dollars as my lease does not actually allow subleasing and that was something the previous management was going to allow me to casually do but did not put in writing for me as I went ahead and signed a lease at a different building, the new management also let me know that Eitel is in fact about a fourth empty! Could be a lot of different things at play there, but I was very surprised.

I'm guessing the recent discounts at LPM ate their lunch. They were priced about the same for brand new unoccupied units with a better set of amenities in the common areas. Now that LPM has filled up I'm sure that will normalize a little bit, but from when I viewed units in Eitel they were a bit run down for the asking price (esp. compared to other new buildings around town).

Run down? It's only 6 years old, was it the quality of finishes or just general maintenance?

There's been some deferred maintenance, I would say. My hunch is that Village Green knew this transaction was going to happen and they stopped putting too much effort into it. My unit is fine, but the hallways could use some paint and so could a lot of the exterior window frames. There was also a desk person who left shortly after I moved in back in August and they never filled that job, etc.

The hallways are strange in the Eitel. Feels like a dorm.

I feel like Eitel is one of those buildings that will have so many stories and people living in it over the years, like fair oaks, and other successful older developments. I've already had some good/weird/ridiculous experiences there, and most everyone seems to have a perception of it.

The hallways are strange in the Eitel. Feels like a dorm.

Agreed but I would guess that is the case at any large >100 unit building, particularly those that are L-shaped, U-shaped, etc. where you have to turn corners. I think that just comes with the territory of living in a large-footprint building.

My current building has 16 units per floor (in a straight line, double-loaded corridor) and it doesn't really feel dorm-y, despite the hallways being narrower and having lower ceilings than most newer developments.

I'm guessing the recent discounts at LPM ate their lunch. They were priced about the same for brand new unoccupied units with a better set of amenities in the common areas. Now that LPM has filled up I'm sure that will normalize a little bit, but from when I viewed units in Eitel they were a bit run down for the asking price (esp. compared to other new buildings around town).

LPM is full? I checked in January and they were at about 90%... "full" usually means roughly 95% occupancy. Maybe they had a run on units in the past month!

*locked*

New downtown units are keeping up with the market. Experts believe demand will continue in 2016.

http://finance-commerce.com/2016/03/rep ... new-units/

Strib on the same topic: Apartment Market Continues to Absorb New Units