DENVER | Main Development Thread #6

[Stonemans_rowJ]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Not a chance the Council allows it in its current form. People were okay with 5 or 10 units here and there. But large buildings, with dozens of units, and no parking, there's not a chance. In this Denver political environment, they'd get crucified.

Interesting data I came across at work yesterday. Over the last five years, the City and County of Denver has averaged 2.30% average population growth per year. Over that same period, the growth in vehicle registrations averaged 3.54% per year. We are adding cars even faster than people. I'll admit that even surprised me.

How about a source for that? That's an interesting and curious figure- very surprising.

Also, wouldn't it make more sense to look at raw numbers, i.e. # of people added/ # of cars added to know if we are adding cars faster than people which you postulate?

[mhays]

Coming out of the recession, new-car sales snapped back. Maybe that's the main reason.

As for apartments, at least three things are important for the less/no-parking concept to work: renters have to want it, developers have to take advantage, and the politics/entitlements have to allow it. Denver seems to have two steps out of three.

It'll be tragic if the law changes. Affordability is a huge reason. But it's also density and urban vitality. Small units, which pencil much better without parking, are ideal for both. Want to add energy to a little retail district with good bus service? Replacing the bungalow around the corner with 40 students, assistant store managers, singers, and retirees will go a long way. Do that a few hundred times and your city can retain something a lot of places lose as they get more expensive.

[RyanD]

Union Tower West:

It's looking really nice and I like the screening on the garage too!

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by Stonemans_rowJ

How about a source for that? That's an interesting and curious figure- very surprising.

Also, wouldn't it make more sense to look at raw numbers, i.e. # of people added/ # of cars added to know if we are adding cars faster than people which you postulate?

State Demographer for population, Department of Revenue for vehicle registrations. (Overall registrations by county, not new vehicles, to answer mhays' question.)

The percentages are from the raw numbers, so they show the same thing. I just needed percentages for my purposes (demonstrating growth rates for lenders).

EDIT: If you want actual numbers, between 2010 and 2015 (so six years) -

Population increased from 604,879 to 677,861, an increase of 72,982. (from the SDO)

Registered vehicles increased from 466,342 to 559,207, an increase of 92,865, (from the DOR)

[DenverInfill]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

State Demographer for population, Department of Revenue for vehicle registrations. (Overall registrations by county, not new vehicles, to answer mhays' question.)

The percentages are from the raw numbers, so they show the same thing. I just needed percentages for my purposes (demonstrating growth rates for lenders).

Do you happen to know if the vehicle registrations by county are for just private vehicles or include fleet/corporate registrations too?

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by DenverInfill

Do you happen to know if the vehicle registrations by county are for just private vehicles or include fleet/corporate registrations too?

Good question. Probably both, since my request was focused on fee collections. But I would have to verify.

[TakeFive]

Presumably fleet cars would be more significant(?) since they're work cars and likely driven on a daily basis, except maybe weekends.

[TakeFive]

Today's News

Illustration courtesy of USGBC via Proud Green Building

"New Denver highrise strikes gold"
July 22, 2016 based on an article written by Heather Benjamin at usgbc.org

One of Denver’s premier construction projects is well under way, and the structure for the Class A office tower will soon be emerging as one of the most monumental buildings in the city’s skyline, reports the U.S. Green Building Council.

1144 Fifteenth will not only be one of the most inspiring buildings in Denver’s history, but also one of the tallest in nearly 30 years. As one of the paramount real estate investment, development and management firms in the world, the Hines vision for 1144 Fifteenth has never been limited to its towering appearance and breathtaking façade, as sustainability and efficiency have been at the forefront of the design. Incorporating a state-of-the-art air filtration system for occupant health and a 10 percent higher energy efficiency rate than similar structures, 1144 Fifteenth strives to be a leader and set a standard for the design and construction of buildings that are environmentally responsible and healthy places to live and work, according to the USGBC.

Even Seattle can appreciate a building like this.

[mhays]

LEED Gold is pretty typical for office buildings in the Northwest, including the ones my company builds. So it's good but sort of expected.

Regarding car ownership, I was referring to the grand total, but the increased volume of new cars would affect that, while also causing some old ones getting junked.

[TakeFive]

And you thought housing prices were ridiculous in Denver

Courtesy: SEATTLE MLS via KUOW

"This Seattle house sold for $100K over asking..."
By CAROLYN ADOLPH • JUN 23, 2016

[comoneymaker]

That is no big deal at all. The Colorado Center buildings are platinum if I remember correctly. The fact that it is new and is only gold rating is actually rather sad.

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by comoneymaker

That is no big deal at all. The Colorado Center buildings are platinum if I remember correctly. The fact that it is new and is only gold rating is actually rather sad.

They're gold. But since they aren't Class AA, they might even B, properties it's probably something that they're even LEED certified.

[Stonemans_rowJ]

Originally Posted by DenverInfill

Do you happen to know if the vehicle registrations by county are for just private vehicles or include fleet/corporate registrations too?

Registrations are obviously an easy metric to track, since presumably the vast majority of people who live here and have cars, have their vehicles registered. However, there also has to be a percent of vehicles on the road that are unregistered and uninsured due to cost. Likewise, people who move here, especially young people still on mommy and daddy's dole, keep their vehicles registered back wherever they are from (at probably a much cheaper cost too)

Whenever you acquire a new or new-to-you vehicle, you'd have two registrations in one year. I myself have registered two vehicles this calendar year even though my wife and I only have 1 car.

How accurate are the census or state demographer figures? How do they count all the heads moving here? Just curious really. I'm sure they have a percent deviation built in or something.

Very surprising that we are adding more vehicles than people on a raw figure basis. Car sharing is booming, car2go just expanded service area and added to the fleet, new buildings without parking, etc. etc.

[RyanD]

For strictly Denver county, I would place my bets on a lot of new registrations coming from Green Valley Ranch. It would be incredibly difficult to live out there (being the most affordable to buy in Denver proper) without a car.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by Stonemans_rowJ

Registrations are obviously an easy metric to track, since presumably the vast majority of people who live here and have cars, have their vehicles registered. However, there also has to be a percent of vehicles on the road that are unregistered and uninsured due to cost. Likewise, people who move here, especially young people still on mommy and daddy's dole, keep their vehicles registered back wherever they are from (at probably a much cheaper cost too)

Whenever you acquire a new or new-to-you vehicle, you'd have two registrations in one year. I myself have registered two vehicles this calendar year even though my wife and I only have 1 car.

How accurate are the census or state demographer figures? How do they count all the heads moving here? Just curious really. I'm sure they have a percent deviation built in or something.

Very surprising that we are adding more vehicles than people on a raw figure basis. Car sharing is booming, car2go just expanded service area and added to the fleet, new buildings without parking, etc. etc.

I would guess there aren't too many unregistered vehicles on the road - that's too easy to verify and get caught, you need license plates and a sticker tag, you don't last long without it. (I'm habitually late with my registrations, and I never make it more than a month or two before I get a ticket - usually Denver. It's illegal to park in the ROW without a current registration.)

The two registrations thing is adjusted for - it's not really two registrations, they're prorated. We have to correct for that in charging fees and such. I'll defer to others on census numbers, but it's as good as we've got.

I'm not that surprised I guess. When we talk about parking-free units, we're measuring a couple hundred. Car2go, same magnitude. Income is a better measure than dependency, and there's no question there are a lot of new well-to-do people moving here. Most will own a car, even if they do live in a part of the city that allow them to use car2go from time to time.

An aside- but did you see where car2go is expanding? That's not an area of growth for the city. It's an area of safety and wealth. (It's where I'm moving later this week - yay for rich white neighborhoods! TBD if I get any use out of the new car2go area. Probably not, considering I can drive my own car to the light rail and park for free.)

[Robert.hampton]

http://southernland.com/portfolio/17th-and-pearl/#

Preliminary rendering ares up for 17th and Pearl.


Big building, really glad they stepped back from 17th and kept the Tavern building.

[mhays]

What's the minimum multifamily unit square footage in Denver, and is there a link? The land use code is in pdf format and I can't download those. The minimum seems to be around 300 square feet.

[seventwenty]

"High plateau" for Denver housing.

Originally Posted by Denver Post

Boud predicts a three-year run of double-digit gains in metro-Denver home prices will come to an end in the second half of the year, ushering in a long stretch of meager price increases and then small declines.

Barring major job losses, Boud doesn’t see a slump like 2007 to 2009, when the metro area suffered a tough stretch of falling home prices that drove a surge in foreclosures and distressed sales.

But the leveling off could require an adjustment in thinking and strategy in a market accustomed to sharp increases in home prices. And someone who buys in 2017 might find themselves sitting on zero appreciation come 2021.

. . .

Rael, in a report he authored on June home sales, also suggested a plateau may be on the horizon for the region, but he said the reference reflects a seasonal trend and not a long-term forecast, which DMAR tries to stay away from making.

June saw a huge 24.4 percent jump in the inventory of homes for sale versus May, an increase about six times the historical average between the two months. And while the overall inventory was still a historically low 6,769, agents note that a change is in the air, even if it hasn’t yet shown up in rates of appreciation, which are still running in the double-digits.

Redfin broker Michelle Ackerman said the big jump in inventory should have translated into more showings this month, but that isn’t happening. Properties are still moving fast, especially on the lower-end of the market. But sellers are getting fewer offers than just a few months ago and fewer buyers are touring homes.

“We look at the 40-year trend line between mortgage costs and incomes. It moves up very slowly and Denver is still 1.8 percent undervalued,” Boud said.

Calling Denver’s housing market undervalued may sound odd. But it is why Real Estate Economics model correctly called for sustained price increases. That model shows metro Denver is moving from an undersupplied and undervalued market to one that is overvalued but still undersupplied.

. . .

So why the shift? Basically, metro Denver home prices have finally reached the limits of what incomes here can support, leaving a thinner cushion to accommodate rising mortgage rates. Real Estate Economics projects that the rate on a 30-year loan, now around 3.6 percent, will slowly climb to 5.8 percent by 2020.

“Those are still low rates, but we are at an artificially low level of mortgage rates,” Boud said. As it becomes more expensive to finance a home, something has to give — home-price appreciation.

One thing the Denver Post article didn't touch on was population increase and its effect on housing. Prior Denver Post articles state that the city added about 18,600 people in 2015.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by Robert.hampton

http://southernland.com/portfolio/17th-and-pearl/#
Preliminary rendering ares up for 17th and Pearl.

Big building, really glad they stepped back from 17th and kept the Tavern building.

Gets a smiley from me. Step-back much appreciated.

Originally Posted by seventwenty

"High plateau" for Denver housing.

One thing the Denver Post article didn't touch on was population increase and its effect on housing. Prior Denver Post articles state that the city added about 18,600 people in 2015.

Interesting. Makes a lot of sense to me. While demand/supply is always a key driver it's not the only driver and affordability is a key factor with demand. Plus, supply does seem to be indeed catching up.

Going forward I see construction which has been a big economic boost becoming net-neutral and then net-negative. But it's a slow moving train with lots of projects under construction out another 12-18 months. It could continue for years potentially but just at a more moderate pace.

Time will tell but I would guess that the Great Migration will also at least slow.

[ddvmke]

Originally Posted by Robert.hampton

http://southernland.com/portfolio/17th-and-pearl/#

Preliminary rendering ares up for 17th and Pearl.


Big building, really glad they stepped back from 17th and kept the Tavern building.

But unfortunately did not retain one of the best patios in the area