Quote:
Originally Posted by pip
The thing is though the Koreans left 20+ years ago and the stores are empty after all this time and this is not a struggling neighborhood. There isn't much retail or anything nearby the neighborhood and I would say the street is 80%-90% vacant. There is not even a bar and maybe only one or two tiny restaurants which were closed. Northeastern Illinois University is nearby too.
So I looked it up and found an article from this year. Northeastern Illinois bought up many of the businesses through eminent domain with the plans of expanding the campus with 300,000 square feet of housing and mixed use on Bryn Mawr but cancelled leaving much of the area with vacant buildings (all the University did was kick everyone out and left the buildings as is but now empty) and thus it spiraled from there. And on top of that landlords can get lower property tax rate if the space is not leased, not just the University. It's hard to get businesses in next to vacant buildings. That is enough for building owners to just leave buildings empty - I'm not sure if the law has been changed but this was recent as of a few years ago and even if the law has changed the damage may have been done already. Reading about this street and vacancy, the residents of the area want something like a bars, restaurants, some retail and mixed use developments. Good luck if the University still owns it - and even on the street were the University doesn't own, its hard to attract investment with vacant stuff nearby.
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Again, healthy neighborhoods can have struggling commercial strips. Hell, when I was growing up in Barrington our downtown was struggling despite incredible wealth in the community. Retail demand is not bottomless and people in the North Park area are clearly taking their retail dollars to other commercial strips or to the suburbs. Chicago has too much commercial-zoned property for our population, at both the citywide scale and in many neighborhoods.
The property tax break for vacancy is essential. Small-time landlords could go under after losing a tenant, unless their holding costs also go down. It's not some conspiracy to keep property vacant. Northeastern as a public institution pays no tax at all, nor are they required to turn a profit so it's a different story if they are still holding the properties.
Also, legacy buildings are different from new mixed-use buildings. Legacy buildings need cash flow and a vacant space is negative cash flow even with a property tax break. New mixed-use buildings are often planned from the start with the idea that the retail space will sit vacant; the income from the apartments above covers the holding cost for the retail space indefinitely. If a retail tenant comes along, that's just gravy but it's not make-or-break.