As elsewhere, the economic downturn will favor infill development in Tucson, as plunging home prices have curtailed most low-end home building on the metro's periphery:
Constuction on a 160-acre parcel is being developed for new homes near Soldier
Trail and Tanque Verde. With a lot of land available and low home prices, many
land parcels have become worthless, with a few exceptions like the foothills.
(photo: David Sanders)
In downturn, raw land for homes now dead weight
Even developed lots, homes on city edge form 'ring of death'
By Josh Brodesky
ARIZONA DAILY STAR
10.25.2009
These are hard times for land in Tucson. Land values soared in the boom when analysts projected growth across the valley, with the metro area stretching southeast to Benson and north across the Pinal County line. But the growth slowed and sputtered, and values plummeted in the bust. While land certainly has an intrinsic value — after all, no one is making any more of it, as the old saying goes — in today's market undeveloped land is often considered worthless, even carrying a negative value to develop because of the costs of adding infrastructure and maintaining the property. "The market is not there for development at this point. You have a situation where you can buy developed property for less than it costs to develop," said John McIlwain, a senior resident fellow with the Urban Land Institute. "It's a reflection of the extremely depressed property prices we have around the country."
In the most basic sense, the issue is one of supply and demand. There are thousands of lots across the valley ready for homes, but few people are buying. Some are finished lots at the far edges of town where growth was once projected but now won't reach for years; others are part of a massive backlog of undeveloped lots — roughly 23,000 — that have been platted for housing. At some point, demand will pick up and the values of these lots will begin to improve, but a number of analysts don't expect that to happen until 2012. The fallout is what Will White of the Land Advisors Organization says will be a "total reorganization of land ownership" across the valley as projects downsize and change, timelines are extended and some developers walk away from properties. "We thought we knew in 2005 every piece of land and how it was going to be planned and developed, and who was going to be doing that," White said. "It's only taken four years for that to change."
"The ring of death"
In builder parlance, the drive-to-qualify ring is the invisible circle around a city where homes become affordable for the starter buyer. These are the cookie-cutter and tract homes found at the edges of town, and between 2004 and 2006 when the median new home price for Pima County skyrocketed from $175,059 to $255,074, that circle was expanding fast and furious. Land couldn't be bought fast enough, and projects became big — very, very big. "Our permits were at all-time highs and with that came the need for bigger projects," White said. "What we saw before, the home prices were rising so high, so it made sense to keep going out a little bit farther and farther and farther because the homes became more affordable." But as foreclosures have flooded the market, and unemployment has followed,
the median price of a new home has plummeted, hitting $185,000 last month, numbers from local housing analyst John L. Strobeck show. All of that downward pressure has pushed the drive-to-qualify ring back toward the city center, reflecting greater affordability. Why drive to Pinal County if you can now afford a home on the northwest side? "The focus is back in the metro area," White said. "And also maybe smaller projects that everyone can get their arms around a little more."
This shift has turned the old drive-to-qualify ring into what developer Jim Campbell calls "the ring of death" where building has ostensibly stopped and plenty of finished lots (and unfinished projects) remain. This ring includes places like Star Valley on the southwest side and Gladden Farms in Marana. Not surprisingly, foreclosure rates are higher in the outskirts, too.
In Marana, one of every 74 homes received some kind of foreclosure filing as of September, numbers from the foreclosure tracking service RealtyTrac show. In Vail, the number was one of 54 homes; and in Sahuarita, it was one of 56 homes. But in the city of Tucson, RealtyTrac shows a foreclosure rate in September of one of every 340 homes, with the rate getting worse toward the city's southern edges.
To Campbell, the biggest fallout of this "ring of death" is that it colors the entire market. There are areas like the northeast side and certain infill projects where land supply is quite limited and values have remained relatively strong, he said. But the thousands of vacant lots out there simply overshadow those niches, making it impossible to get financing for a quality piece of land. "It doesn't matter if there are a thousand lots in Star Valley. That doesn't impact northeast Tucson. If you are talking about finished lots or platted lots in the middle of the city, they are definitely worth more than lots in northern Marana," Campbell said of niche markets. But even in those stronger locations, there is just no financing available. "You can't find money for raw land. And you also can't find money to finish the platted lots which are out there," Campbell said. "What they (the banks) are assuming is there are plenty of finished lots even though most of them, if not all of them, are way out there in the ring of death."
The long road back
A few projects and deals are moving forward in Tucson, but these are mostly smaller projects serving niche markets or land deals that came at good prices and were bought with cash or hard money loans — and these projects still come with plenty of risk. Campbell has two small infill projects on the east side, for example. Developer Chris Kemmerly of Miramonte Homes recently purchased 112 lots at Dove Mountain on the far northwest side for $4.76 million. Developer Michael Carlier is moving dirt on Rancho Soldados, a gated community on the far northeast side with lots starting at $259,000. The high-end home market has been soft, but Carlier said he can go forward in this market because he is serving a specific niche. "There has not been a gated community built (in the area) in years," he said. So far, he's had about a half-dozen lot reservations, a fairly strong start.
But he also has a lengthy timeline on the project: four years to build out. And that's how long it may take for things to rebound. Going forward, no one is sure how foreclosures and unemployment will continue to affect the slump. About the only sure thing out there is that no one is making any new land. "The bottom line is, there is a limited amount of land, and there is a limited amount of good land," said developer Don Diamond, no stranger to economic cycles. "It will come back, and it will be worth good money. Everything is fine," he said. "It's my fifth business cycle since 1962. . . . It's going to be coming back slower. Nothing is going to happen in the next two or three years. But slowly, but surely, the good stuff is being absorbed."
From boom to bust
The slowdown in building permits says it all about new-home construction.
Year 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009*
Permits 6,887 7,493 8,511 9,560 11,762 8,578 5,044 3,108 1,800 - 2000*
* Projected numbers for the year.
SOURCE: The Southern Arizona Housing Market Letter, John L. Strobeck
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