Seattle Condo Review: Blog with News & Advice about Seattle Condos

1111 E Pike Tour

     

The 1111 E Pike building is nearing completion.  The 6-story building has 26 residential homes and two commercial spaces.  One of commercial spaces will be occupied by Cupcake Royale.  I took a quick tour on Tuesday but unfortunately was unable to take any pictures as they are not allowed.

There are 6 homes on each floor with the exception of the penthouse level which will have 3 homes (2 of which has been spoken for).  2nd floor homes have concrete floors and the other homes have dark hardwood floors.  The lobby and roof top decks are the only amenities.  Homeowner dues are expected to be less than 50 cents per square foot.  Square footage for these homes ranges from 600-1,200.  Most of the homes are priced $250,000 to $450,00.  There is only one penthouse unit available priced at $450,000 (~652 square feet). 

Enso Update

I attended Enso's sneak preview event for brokers a couple days ago.  In response to the current market conditions, the developer has revised their pricing on their homes.  There was a pretty big turn out for the event.  All their 12th floor homes were opened for viewing. 

Here are a couple observations:

The Enclave on Lake Union

Got this press release from the Enclave marketing team.  Seems like a neat project.  I was impressed with the square footage and pretty sweet location.  Will be interesting to see if they get some takers to commit pre-construction in exchange for the "introductory pricing."  I'd want some kind of protection against price reductions as well as pretty low earnest money to consider an early committment.

Here's the full press release:

SEATTLE, WA. (June 24, 2009) – Officials at Trinity Real Estate, Inc. today released plans for their newest project “The Enclave”, a 21-unit lakeside community nestled within the 5-acre redevelopment known as “Wards Cove” on Lake Union. The coveted site is considered by many the last of its kind on what is now a largely built-out waterfront in King County. Its developers say that the project is designed like a horizontal high-rise from a quality standpoint but unlike a high-rise, The Enclave can be developed in distinct phases to help with construction financing. The announcement arrives at a time when few, if any, new developments have commenced since the onset of the commercial credit crunch in the summer of 2007, two years ago.

Seattle Condo Owners

With the market still pretty slow for sellers, lots of folks are facing the classic rent or sell question.  What do you think they should do?

Athena Condo (Queen Anne)

The Athena condo was one of the first apartment conversion projects during the condo boom in 2005.  This 91 residential condo building is conveniently located on lower Queen Anne (323 Queen Anne Ave N).  The project was developed by Pryde Corporation, which is the same group of developers who did the conversion for Onyx and Asia Condos.

Studio, one bedroom and two bedroom units offer square footage ranging from ~400 for a studio, 485 to 759 for a one bedroom, and 880 to 952 for a two bedroom.

The Florentine- Pioneer Square Condo

 

The Florentine Condominium is a historic building located on the south edge of Pioneer Square on 526 1st Ave South.  It was built in 1909 and converted from a warehouse into 116 condos in 1990. 

During the conversion, an additional floor was built on top of this four story building as the penthouse homes (2 level townhomes).  Some might like to call it a loft style home.  Floor plans go from one bedroom, one bathroom to two bedroom penthouses.

One Bedroom plus den & Two bedroom     1,036-1,644 sq ft

Penthouse Homes                                 1,253-2,106 sq ft

Condo Updates

I've been working OT on a few deals so have a lot of catching up to do for the blog.  Here is some of the latest Seattle condo market news:  

First off, The Schuster Group's proposed project on the corner of Elliott and Cedar St (previously named as Bellora 2 at UrbanCondominiums.com in 2007) is heading for Downtown Design Review Board on June 23rd.  The proposed project will housed 120 condos and may go as high as 14 stories.  The last time I spoke to the developer's office, they were waiting for the market to recover.  Construction may not start for a year or two.  So, it will be a few years before we see this project.  Read more here. 

May 2009 Seattle Condo Market Stats

Northwest MLS just released May 2009 stats. As you may recall in April, we had pending sales up almost 50% from March. How did May pan out?

First Church Converting to Townhomes

(Pictures provided by Moira Holley, archived under Seattle Condo Gallery)

As it turns out, First Church of Christ is turning into a 12-unit townhome building.  Last week, they debuted their model home.  During today's broker's open house, I had the chance to tour the building and meet up with the developer.  Even though it is not a condo project, I thought it was still worth checking out and let's be honest, there aren't exactly a stampede of new condos being announced every week like in the good old days (and yes, I appreciate those days are part of the reason we're in a recession but they were good if you liked writing about new condos).

Seattle Condo market: Bottom, anyone?

Couldn't help but notice a nice shape starting to form in Altos Research's median price chart.

 

Hard to say if this is a blip or if it's the end of dropping prices.  If it is, so much for the wisdom of the crowds (at least the SCR poll respondendents) since half of the readers out there were predicting bottom would be in 2010 or later.  I too was a bit more pessimistic than the chart above and had predicted bottom this fall but glad to be proven wrong if this trends holds up ;-)

Some fun quotes from the original post.

Da' bears:

I think the end of fall is quite optimistic. Seattle has not felt the effects of layoffs from WaMu, Boeing, Weyerhauser, and Microsoft to name a few. Seattle tends to lag in the real estate market compared to other markets in the U.S., so only time will tell. If I had to predict the bottom for Seattle, I'd say 2010 Q4.
Posted by: John | Apr 13, 2009 9:56:48 AM

I predict the bottom will be end of 2012. Seattle's problems with traffic, dying companies like Microsoft and WAMU, and unsupportive state government will cause prices to come down an additional 50-70% before hitting bottom for Seattle at the end of 2012 and even after that, there will be no improvement, just lack of losses. My advice is to buy precious metals and short the US equity markets.
Posted by: Albert | Apr 13, 2009 1:44:57 PM

Da' bulls:

@Albert
Seriously? C'mon dude, get a grip. It's a recession, it's not Armageddon. Have fun in your bunker with your canned food.
Posted by: Harry | Apr 13, 2009 8:58:00 PM

My intuition says bottom at end of the Fall and slow, gradual, not too exciting "normal" growth over the next few years. 

Posted by: Wendy Leung 

More Support for First Time Home Buyers

In some cases, first time home buyers can borrow against their $8,000 first time buyer tax credit and apply it to down payment and/or closing costs.

Aubrey at the PI has all the details here.

Lumen Auction

 

Lumen announced today that they are auctioning off 19 of their remaining homes on Saturday, July 11th at 1.00pm at the Grand Hyatt Hotel.  A pre-auction seminar will be held for interested buyers on Wednesday, July 1st at 7.00pm.  Home buyers can learn more about the auction process during the seminar and participate in a mock auction as well.

Floor Plan                              Minimum Bid                  Square feet

One Bedroom                     $155,000-$175,000               629-829

One Bedroom + Loft                    $260,000                     1,003-1,034

Two Bedroom                     $275,000-$325,000             1,075-,1286

Large One Bedroom + Loft          $395,000                        1,631

Large Two Bedroom + Den          $795,000                        2,082

Related Posts:

Queen Anne High School Auction

Press Auction: Going once, Going twice, Gone!

Seventeen07 Auction

              

Madison Lofts cuts Prices

Madison Lofts sent out this email recently.   

Prices reduced up to $50,000.

 

Example of new pricing:

 

Home 204 - Was $699,950 - Now $649,950

Home 306 - Was $569,950 - Now $539,950

Home 310 - Was $499,950 - Now $479,950 

 

Madison Lofts is 55% sold and approved for FHA financing. With FHA financing, buyers' down payments can be as low as 3.5% for qualified buyers.

Seaboard Condo #1002

There was an interesting open house held yesterday at the Seaboard building #1002.  The home is currently owned by longtime developer, William Justen.  If you are wondering how the home of a reputable developer looks, check this out.

(Photos from NWMLS, archived at Seattle Condo Review Gallery)

The condo has a feel of new mixed with old feel plus some techy features.  Some of the highlights of the home are the exposed brick walls, original curved windows, coffered ceilings, fireplace, reclaimed wood floors, built-in shelves, heated bathroom floors, modern art lights, a concealed closet (probably can be used as a panic room as well : ), and plenty of walls for artwork.  It only has one bedroom and a second bedroom can be created near the media space which has a hidden murphy bed.  This home is approx. 2,535 square feet and asking for $2.29M.

Alex Condo Update

I received this update from the Alex condo marketer. It looks like Alex will be completing in the summer though the developer is hoping the market picks up some more before they officially start selling.

Furthermore, it also looks like they're going to try and avoid over-pricing and dropping prices after a few months by pricing more "reasonably" and consistent with market conditions.  

Lastly, if/when the developer does decide to start selling the homes, they plan to have 3 model homes available to show it to the public.

Related posts:

Condo Update
Alex Condos Update