[LMich]

Yeah, the demand is definitely there. The most recent downtown market study showed that the immediate downtown area could easily absorb another 300 to 400 additional rental units over the next four years, and it's well known that just about every one of the major urban living developments downtown have a waiting list.

Developers have been decrying the tight credit market for their lack of developing over the past three or so years. I do wonder how much truth there is to that, and whether they are just content at the moment sitting on what are all obviously and highly profitable developments they squeaked in before the national economic downtown and not willing to take the risk.

Yeah, I definitely like Townsend's stuff better than Gillespie's. Gillespie seems to do kind of lower-quality (or at least less sustainable), Disneyfied urban living. And, because of that and and given the state of the economy it'd definitely be worth it now for these developers to sprinkle a 10-unit development here and a 10-unit development there. I can also see why Gillespie doesn't like to do smaller stuff. He'd have to charge higher prices per unit and have to increase the overall quality of his stuff if he wanted it to sell at the higher price.

On the price, I was actually surprised to hear about the increases in rents, so I went and looked it up and was shocked. You know have one-bedrooms running for $900 at The Arbaugh, $1,200 at Motor Wheels, high $800 at Prudden Place...

These used to be bargains. This is definitely an argument for increasing the number of units to get these prices lower. There are so few options and so few developers they are charging whatever they want.