http://www.abc15.com/content/realestate/...ll-they-ever/R6ohpuEtVkCQfSsse4YeiA.cspx (see video, upper right)
TEMPE, AZ - They are the tallest buildings in the East Valley - but they may never be finished.
"All my money is tied up in this, and if that money is lost, I'm going to be really wiped out," said buyer Mike Williard.
He had expected to be calling Tempe Centerpoint Towers - Unit 305 - home by now.
"It's got a beautiful view of Centerpoint Plaza and looking into the trees," he said. "Everything was done in my unit, ready to move in."
After putting down an $81,000 deposit on the condo three years ago, today he's stuck outside the fence.
"I feel like I own a piece of this building," Williard said.
For those buyers that put up deposits, that money may never come back.
"I don't think there's any likelihood that they'll get any of their money back," said Mark Winkelman, CEO of ML Manager LLC, the entity handling the upcoming foreclosure auction of the 375-unit Centerpoint development.
In an exclusive hard hat tour, Winkelman showed ABC15 finished condos on the 17th floor and the unfinished 7,500-square-foot 22nd floor penthouse, complete with a lap pool, hot tub, and views in every direction.
SEE PICTURES FROM THE TOUR IN THE ABOVE PHOTO SLIDESHOW
"One of these days it's going to be an absolutely amazing unit for someone," Winkelman said.
Winkelman said 90 percent of the condos in the shorter 22-story south tower are nearly done, but the 30-story north tower needs a lot more work.
"It's a major project, and it was a major project for the developer. It's still a major project for whoever ends of buying it and taking it on," Winkelman said.
"Something has to be done to this thing," said ASU real estate professor Dr. Jay Butler. "You can't continue to let it simply exist. Do you implode it? Start over again?"
Butler said the high-rise lifesyle is unproven here in the Valley.
"That market probably really never existed in the depth that anybody was hoping for," Butler said.
Centerpoint is not alone.
A glut of available units being built, combined with a down economy and depressed home values, have left a number of condo projects in trouble.
Projects like Summit at Copper Square, 44 Monroe, and Chateaux on Central, among others, have all had financial difficulty.
"If it takes you a lot of time to finish a project, markets turn. They don't last forever, and that's really what happened here," Butler said.
"The losses are massive," Winkelman said.
Construction at Centerpoint came to a halt a year and a half ago.
Developer Tempe Land Co. LLC ran out of money.
The primary lender, Mortgages Ltd., filed for bankruptcy after the suicide of its chairman, Scott Coles.
Now, the project is scheduled to be auctioned off in April.
"I've heard values ranging from zero to 40 or 50 million dollars in its current state," Winkelman said.
When it does finally open, the units might be rented as apartments rather than sold as condos.
Despite all the delays and difficulties, Williard still wants to call Centerpoint home.
"I think it's a beautiful building. It's just a little rough around the edges here," Williard said. "I still am hopeful that I can live here maybe a year from now. And I'm sure that five years in the future this will be a vibrant busy plaza."
Williard and the other 40 early buyers can file with the bankruptcy court to try to get their deposits back, but they're in line behind the project's primary investors and the unpaid contractors.
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now as long as our plans survive the upcoming public meetings. Damn seniors!
What if they still want to live in the building still and don't want their deposits back? Would they have to put down new deposits with the new owner to hold their unit? Or does it all depend on the terms of the bankruptcy?
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