Looks like that's all it's good for.

The way this is going, the best we can expect is a 12 storey rental apartment ironically called "SkyCity".

To be honest, if the outcome of this was a 12 story residential building with grocery store on that surface lot, I'd be happy. A new tallest would be nice, but several mid-sized residential buildings would really help fill out the downtown. Especially if they replace surface parking lots.

I would looooove a 12 storey residential building on that lot. Retail (bonus), Grocery (massive bonus), tall building (bonus), Winnipeg's tallest (super bonus).

I said this before, if, when this thing was announced last year they announced a 12 storey condo for the site people would have been shitting out unicorns.

+1. :cheers:

Eventually you run out of idiots to sell junk bonds to...

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/loc...260372621.html

Wait a year and the internet will be full of posts from people who were "duped" by Jawad Rathore and his team...there are already plenty from his previous time in securities (before he was banned for life and fined $3 million).

Oh oh, this thread's google rank is rising... I hope it doesn't suffer the same fate as the last one!

Well put and very accurate. Even if this particular project was cut in half it would still be a net gain for downtown no matter how you look at it.

What is unfortunate is that the people investing are very inexperienced types of investors. Just look at the pictures of the "brokers" they have at their events - do those people look like they know real estate?

The whole concept behind Fortress works very well in an upswing, but in a downswing, the investors get hurt. Fortress takes their massive fees right off the top, which is why they announce so many projects and buy so many vacant sites. It's easy to get a nice fancy rendering.

How's anybody going to build a 12-storey complex on land that they paid $9.5MM for? They would assuredly be in default to the original investors on that purchase - a separate entity altogether - and would likely be sued for misrepresentation. Fortress either has to get the value out of that land - which is somewhere on the order of 380 units - or they have to buy out the original investors and take a write-down on the value which would have to come out of their pocket. That would also be their first money into the project; lighting about $4MM on fire.

Stop paying any attention to this project.

He is correct.

I have paid for land the past 5 years:

12 units: $200K = $16.66K per unit

24 units: $250K = $10.4K per unit

Sky City 380 units : $9.5M = $25K per unit if they build all the units.

If the project is downsized to 1/2 then it will be $50K per unit.

That is pretty tough to sell a $200K condo when the land cost if $50K.

I'll be totally honest...if this thing manages to get shovels in the ground, I'd be more than happy to buy into it.

Could be the case. This was added the other day to the SkyCity Twitter account but dated Oct.21.

https://twitter.com/FortressRDI/stat...44910775803904

So is EllisDon coming in to provide funding? Why else would they partner with a construction firm at this point. EllisDon is not a stupid, inexperienced "broker". So I would have to think they're not coming in to this to skim some fees.

This is just a general partnership between MAdy and ED. ED is going to build all of Mady's stuff across canada. They aren't involved financially. If Mady gets a project off the ground, ED builds it.

Ahh, I see. It's just a general partnership, not specific to SkyCity.

Nope.

Mady can't form the bond, EllisDon steps in. It's worth noting that there are very few subs left in Winnipeg who are willing to work with EllisDon anymore after the airport fiasco. Interesting partnership.

Doesn't sound very good to me. Kind of the "on life support" announcement.

This is just an everyday press release from the Toronto office talking about how EllisDon will now be the constructor-of-favour for Mady's high-rise projects. It's just there to get the EllisDon troops excited. It really has no bearing on SkyCity, good or bad.

The only thing of note in this release is that EllisDon does have an equity arm. The fact that they aren't explicitly stating that they're partnering with Mady to float them through construction tells you all you need to know about Mady.

So congratulations to EllisDon; if Mady can pay them, they'll construct their high-rises for them. As would anybody. I'm not sure this is news.

Okay, cool. It was starting to sounds like a P3 type scenario. EllisDon funds and builds the thing. Then "sells it back to the owner". We'll see if EllisDon gets their hands into the Transitway P3. ED also is building Keeyask.

I don't think there's any doubt. There are only a few companies that can both carry that bond and hold the financing on a P3 of that size.