ATLANTA | Development Thread VI

[Sbgt92]

Originally Posted by skyscraperpage17

A good salesperson can tell of someone's really serious about making a purchase.

Not saying the unpeofessional behavior is right, but the reality is every individual handles bullshit differently (some have zero tolerance for it).

Our experience was pretty positive. It's a challenge, though, to make the plunge for a "typical" home buyer. Normally, we would sell our home, use the funds to make the down payment for a place at Opus. However, with the project years off, they are still requiring a commitment of 25% to lock in the unit. (I'm going off of memory, but 25% is what's in my head)

We would still need to live in our current home, obviously, until Opus was complete, so that 25% commitment would just have be cash on hand, and not the proceeds from our sale. That cash on hand would require an extraordinary effort on our part, and way too much risk. I suppose we could sell our current home, and live in an apartment, and use the proceeds from the sale to commit to Opus, but that's very disruptive and a non-starter

I think they are shooting for a demographic that won't miss $250,000 to lock in the unit. I truly wish them luck, but for now, we're waiting until they are out of the ground before we could even consider any kind of plunge.

[Neighbor]

Originally Posted by ATL CTO

So what's the latest on OPUS? The small crane that was there seems to have only been on site for a day. Maybe related to the MOXY hotel across the street?

I can see the entire site from my roof, and nothing seems to change over there. They seemingly tore up the site without any of the usual suspects you expect on a site like this such as concrete, trucks, building materials, people, or anything else (I'm no expert but it's pretty glaring).

Like you said 3000, it's pretty sketchy and need someone to call their bluff if they are having uninformed buyers come into the sales gallery and put down payments on a project that has no real movement forward. How often does this situation like this occur in other projects and or in other cities?

For what its worth, the sales rep was from Shanghai and spoke fluent chinese. I suspect that they are hoping to attract foreign buyers looking for a place to park their money. This model has played out in Miami, Vancouver and many other cities - I guess Atlanta is up to bat now. While I don't necessarily have an issue with this at a minor level, it may be what we need to get these buildings off the ground, I do not want to see this play out into a crisis that so many other cities have experienced going down this road.

[BlueSangha]

I was wondering about Novare a few posts back. They’re buying up land in Buckhead specifically near Peachtree and Maple.

[skyscraperpage17]

Originally Posted by Sbgt92

Our experience was pretty positive. It's a challenge, though, to make the plunge for a "typical" home buyer. Normally, we would sell our home, use the funds to make the down payment for a place at Opus. However, with the project years off, they are still requiring a commitment of 25% to lock in the unit. (I'm going off of memory, but 25% is what's in my head)

We would still need to live in our current home, obviously, until Opus was complete, so that 25% commitment would just have be cash on hand, and not the proceeds from our sale. That cash on hand would require an extraordinary effort on our part, and way too much risk. I suppose we could sell our current home, and live in an apartment, and use the proceeds from the sale to commit to Opus, but that's very disruptive and a non-starter

I think they are shooting for a demographic that won't miss $250,000 to lock in the unit. I truly wish them luck, but for now, we're waiting until they are out of the ground before we could even consider any kind of plunge.

If that's the case, then I say let the free market work its magic.

Either the project will, in fact, never occur or they will adjust their plans so that the product they're offering is more in line with what people are willing to purchase.

They don't seem interested in the latter direction though, because it would obviously mean a much lower ROI on their investment. So in the mean time, they'll just continue paying taxes (I assume, unless they've received a ton of abatements) on land that's not generating any revenue for them until if / when they sell it to a serious developer.

[Atlantis]

8/16/2018
City inks deal for Gulch development, with more signs pointing to possibility of Amazon HQ2

"ATLANTA — The largest incentive package in State history is being offered to a company that promises to revitalize the area in Downtown known as The Gulch.

This week, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms announced a tentative agreement with California-based development group CIM. That company offered $15 million for the Gulch. In return, the city is offering them almost a billion dollars (yes, billions with a B) in public funds to so the group can develop the 13 city blocks into mixed-use facilities, that are supposed to include 200 units of affordable housing. (As a comparison, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium only got $700 million from the public.)

That big chunk of cash will come from two places. First, the developers get to tap into the City's sales tax. They'll get about four cents of the 8.9-cent tax. Second, the City Council needs to approve extending the Westside tax allocation district until 2048. That means, for the next 30 years (yes, 30 years), some of the property taxes for that area will be put into bonds for continued investment.

But what the city hasn't announced - but 11Alive has confirmed - is that the offer to CIM doesn't end there. 11Alive has confirmed that CIM can get as much as $1.75 billion in public money if they can fulfill the Gulch to its true potential.

What does that term "true potential" mean?
According to a City official 11Alive spoke to, that means $5 billion of construction costs. And if that figure sounds familiar - it should. That's the same amount Amazon promised to invest in whichever city is chosen as the next headquarters. And as the Gulch has been tossed around as a possible site for the global headquarters.

...But don't expect anyone to come right out and say it's a done deal any time soon."

Article - https://www.11alive.com/article/news...2/85-584544755
__________________

[briantech]

Originally Posted by Triptychtwo

Auto Ignition and Battery is going to look even more out of place with that tower next to it...



This tower was supposed to be residential when it was first proposed, I doubt they are building spec...crazy that 1105 hasn't started yet...

That place would make such a cool restaurant / bar / patio type place. Like Leon's in Decatur.

[Atlriser]

That story is full of inaccuracies I believe. The MB didn’t receive $700M and the sales tax money comes from the state portion not the cities if I’m not mistaken.

[Atlanta3000]

Originally Posted by Jacobguy

https://twitter.com/No2OpusPlace
Here ya go!

Enter the Mind of a Crazy Person

I am sure 99.9% read that Twitter handle and read it as: No 2 Opus Place.

This is what I see:

No2..........Opus Place

I think all the "grown ups" here know what a No2 is:

[skyscraperpage17]

Originally Posted by Atlriser

That story is full of inaccuracies I believe. The MB didn’t receive $700M and the sales tax money comes from the state portion not the cities if I’m not mistaken.

I recall hearing $600 million for MBS from another source.

Regardless, it's splitting hairs. Whether were talkimg $600 million or $700 million, it's still a ridiculously large amount in incentives.

[briantech]

Originally Posted by Atlantis

8/16/2018
City inks deal for Gulch development, with more signs pointing to possibility of Amazon HQ2

"ATLANTA — The largest incentive package in State history is being offered to a company that promises to revitalize the area in Downtown known as The Gulch.

This week, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms announced a tentative agreement with California-based development group CIM. That company offered $15 million for the Gulch. In return, the city is offering them almost a billion dollars (yes, billions with a B) in public funds to so the group can develop the 13 city blocks into mixed-use facilities, that are supposed to include 200 units of affordable housing. (As a comparison, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium only got $700 million from the public.)

That big chunk of cash will come from two places. First, the developers get to tap into the City's sales tax. They'll get about four cents of the 8.9-cent tax. Second, the City Council needs to approve extending the Westside tax allocation district until 2048. That means, for the next 30 years (yes, 30 years), some of the property taxes for that area will be put into bonds for continued investment.

But what the city hasn't announced - but 11Alive has confirmed - is that the offer to CIM doesn't end there. 11Alive has confirmed that CIM can get as much as $1.75 billion in public money if they can fulfill the Gulch to its true potential.

What does that term "true potential" mean?
According to a City official 11Alive spoke to, that means $5 billion of construction costs. And if that figure sounds familiar - it should. That's the same amount Amazon promised to invest in whichever city is chosen as the next headquarters. And as the Gulch has been tossed around as a possible site for the global headquarters.

...But don't expect anyone to come right out and say it's a done deal any time soon."

Article - https://www.11alive.com/article/news...2/85-584544755
__________________

Wait what? They will pay the city $15m for the property... and in exchange the tax payers of Atlanta give them $1,000,000,000? How the hell does that math work out in anyone's favor except the developer?

[GeorgiaPeanuts]

With regards to Opus. It is bullshit to say they are just pushing dirt around on the lot. They've been doing granite blasting and the site has slowly but surely been cleared out and leveled. If they had a ways to go at the time of the first picture until they would be going vertical then it makes no sense to rush and finish the site prep as fast as possible when it is obviously better visually for sales to see activity at the site.

From April:


From a week ago:

[Verge]

Originally Posted by skyscraperpage17

I recall hearing $600 million for MBS from another source.

Regardless, it's splitting hairs. Whether were talkimg $600 million or $700 million, it's still a ridiculously large amount in incentives.

Not at ALL TRUE-- The city funded $200M of stadium construction costs from the Hotel-Motel tax only. The $700M is maintenance and upkeep for the next 20 years, also from the Hotel-Motel tax. This is the same money that would have been spent on the Georgia Dome in upkeep during that period. FYI-- this portion of the Hotel-Motel tax is devoted, by law, to the stadium and cannot be used for anything else-- Get your incentives straight please--

[Atlanta3000]

Originally Posted by GeorgiaPeanuts

With regards to Opus. It is bullshit to say they are just pushing dirt around on the lot. They've been doing granite blasting and the site has slowly but surely been cleared out and leveled. If they had a ways to go at the time of the first picture until they would be going vertical then it makes no sense to rush and finish the site prep as fast as possible when it is obviously better visually for sales to see activity at the site.

What is not bullshit is:

• The developer does not have a General Contractor
• The developer has not filed a Permit with the City since 01/2017
• The Sales Gallery Agent told a forum member, Neighbor, they plan to start foundation work in a month or two. How is that possible when they don't have a permit and it can take six months?
• The developer has not paid $150K in Impact Fees

So don't shoot the messenger.

Most importantly, based on the list above the developer is just pushing dirt because it appears they don't have a path forward to go vertical as one would expect at this juncture. Make sense?

[Atlanta3000]

Originally Posted by Verge

Not at ALL TRUE-- The city funded $200M of stadium construction costs from the Hotel-Motel tax only. The $700M is maintenance and upkeep for the next 20 years, also from the Hotel-Motel tax. This is the same money that would have been spent on the Georgia Dome in upkeep during that period. FYI-- this portion of the Hotel-Motel tax is devoted, by law, to the stadium and cannot be used for anything else-- Get your incentives straight please--

$700M/20 = $35M a year. WTF kind of maintenance and upkeep are they doing?

[Pemgin]

I guess it looks like Opus is just pushing dirt around, but if that's all they wanted to do, why would they bother to go through the trouble of blasting the rock, too? Seems like they could have just dug a shallow hole to push dirt around instead of going deeper.

[skyscraperpage17]

Originally Posted by Verge

Not at ALL TRUE-- The city funded $200M of stadium construction costs from the Hotel-Motel tax only. The $700M is maintenance and upkeep for the next 20 years, also from the Hotel-Motel tax. This is the same money that would have been spent on the Georgia Dome in upkeep during that period. FYI-- this portion of the Hotel-Motel tax is devoted, by law, to the stadium and cannot be used for anything else-- Get your incentives straight please--

So in actuality, if I understand your post correctly, taxpayers are contributing a total of $900 million dollars to MBS.

I don't care if it's legally mandated or not. It's still a shit ton of public dollars being used for a mere sports stadium built specifically for use by privately-owned, multi-billion dollar enterprises.

[Username123]

https://atlanta.curbed.com/2018/5/4/17316250/midtown-atlanta-condo-tower-no2-opus-place
Edit: I’m referring to Opus here.

Fwiw, one of their people said in this May 4th Curbed article that they would be digging about 20 feet below grade in some areas, and that they would “start full force around September or October, assuming no delays.”

As far as the ground work goes, that would put them within their schedule. They do need to get their permits in order still. How long would that take, if they were to try to get them squared away now?

[Verge]

Originally Posted by Atlanta3000

$700M/20 = $35M a year. WTF kind of maintenance and upkeep are they doing?

Correction-- that is money generated by the tax in a 30 year period-- not money spent every year. I suspect in about 10 years we'll see a $200+M renovations, etc. A lot of money for sure-- but the initial outlay was not a terrible deal.

[Atlanta3000]

Originally Posted by Pemgin

I guess it looks like Opus is just pushing dirt around, but if that's all they wanted to do, why would they bother to go through the trouble of blasting the rock, too? Seems like they could have just dug a shallow hole to push dirt around instead of going deeper.

The developer started blasting granite 12/18/2017 or 242 days ago. I am not sure they could have pulled this ruse off this long without using the excuse of blasting granite.

https://atlanta.curbed.com/2017/12/18/16782682/no2-opus-place-groundbreaking-construction

[Atlanta3000]

Originally Posted by skyscraperpage17

So in actuality, if I understand your post correctly, taxpayers are contributing a total of $900 million dollars to MBS.

I don't care if it's legally mandated or not. It's still a shit ton of public dollars being used for a mere sports stadium built specifically for use by privately-owned, multi-billion dollar enterprises.

To be clear, the CoA citizens are not paying $900 Million in taxes toward the project. The money is coming from hotel taxes. That is not to say it is not bullshit because the CoA could have used this revenue to fund other projects.