DENVER | Main Development Thread #7

[Arapahoe]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

Did you take a long siesta and just wake up?


The fact that developers have bought up tons of land over the last decade... the fact that it takes time to entitle land... the fact that their are master developers selling parcels to builders for development...

Also, go back through the news for 2021 as to how many parcels of land have been sold in RiNo. There's a bunch of em.

Didn't you mention recently that you drove down So Santa Fe and noticed construction you weren't previously aware of? Well, before shovels went into the ground there was land that 'somebody' had to buy.

For you next excursion drive down So Broadway to south of Evans; there are several projects that have broken ground or are pending. That was all land that somebody had to buy.

Speaking of land development.


Carla Ferreira, director of Onsite Development and a principal at The Aurora Highlands, won the Young Leader Award.

Aurora Highlands Wins Five Awards at Denver MAME Awards
November 18, 2021 - Mile High CRE

12,500 homes and four new schools isn't chopped liver.


How about 41-acres of Urban Renewal and TOD

Former Denver Post printing facility officially ‘blighted,’ paving the way for massive redevelopment in Globeville
Nov 29, 2021 By Esteban L. Hernandez/Denverite

Wait... you want more?


In case you missed it...

EAST WEST PARTNERS TO REDEVELOP CHERRY CREEK WEST
November 24, 2021


How about 72 acres on a hilltop?

Homebuilder pays $14M for 25 acres of Loretto Heights campus
October 13, 2021 By ERIC HEINZ | BusinessDen



Courtesy of Westside Investment Partners


Awesome classic by the Stones

lol, love it. Do people really think there is plentiful AND cheap land in any city of merit? So absurd -- that doesn't mean there isn't development opportunity. Take a look at satellite image of Arapahoe Sq, or 62 acres of the River Mile or 80 acres around Empower field or another 8 acres at Gate District or the entirely empty FULL city blocks right in CBD, the greyhound block, etc etc. This city is riddled with vacant lots. Sure, not every single one is on the market simultaneously, but owners aren't really sentimentally attached to their parking lots, they buy land as investments. They will sell when the right opportunity arises.

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

Did you take a long siesta and just wake up?

The fact that developers have bought up tons of land over the last decade... the fact that it takes time to entitle land... the fact that their are master developers selling parcels to builders for development...

I did take a siesta, it was quite nice but I also tend to zone out when the forum goes to homelessness. We spent $483 million last year on it for 6,100 people metrowide, almost $80k per person. We should absolutely be deriving better results for that kind of money.

As pertains housing, you're not wrong as to the level of activity but I don't look to one or ten or fifty projects to validate my beliefs on housing - that's what we call confirmation bias IMO. Rather, I look at data and interpret the objective result. We have significantly more people that want housing than there is available housing existing or proposed to satisfy the overall need and so prices will keep rising resulting in an elite city for the rich. To Bunt's point, we also don't produce it necessarily where people "want" to be but this issue is so overwhelming right now I don't think that distinction even matters anymore - people are going where they can survive at this point and have any housing or they are leaving Denver entirely, just like they're abandoning the coasts for Denver. So while you're buffet of development is spot on, the point is it's not nearly enough and it's being artificially held back. For me, as someone developing very large projects in Denver right now, land is the #1 throttle restrictor, followed by ongoing/generational labor issues in the trades which have resulted in astronomical cost increases the past decade, but pointedly in the last 5 years and an insane increase in 2021 as a result of supply chain.

I know you and many others think this is just the way it is, but it really doesn't have to be this way. We could open the floodgates so to speak with what Ken suggests, allow tri/four plex on every lot and meaningfully upzone (quickly) large swaths of transit corridors and arterials. This would help make available more land for development to more developers, including non-traditional developers who don't need a maze of administrative expertise and financial horsepower to navigate a complex zoning/permitting system for large projects. Permitting houses is easy...real easy comparatively. This kind of change has the effect of opening up more land for more diverse development options AND allowing for more people to develop housing. We often forget that up until the crazy administrative growth of permitting starting in the 90's, normal folks used to develop stuff all the time. Some row homes on an end block, a mom and pop shopping center, etc etc. Development doesn't have to be reserved for the sophisticated money, we could open it up to the average American household if we wanted to. Talk about equity...that's equity.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by laniroj

allow tri/four plex on every lot and meaningfully upzone (quickly) large swaths of transit corridors and arterials. This would help make available more land for development to more developers, including non-traditional developers who don't need a maze of administrative expertise and financial horsepower to navigate a complex zoning/permitting system for large projects. Permitting houses is easy...real easy comparatively. This kind of change has the effect of opening up more land for more diverse development options AND allowing for more people to develop housing. We often forget that up until the crazy administrative growth of permitting starting in the 90's, normal folks used to develop stuff all the time. Some row homes on an end block, a mom and pop shopping center, etc etc. Development doesn't have to be reserved for the sophisticated money, we could open it up to the average American household if we wanted to. Talk about equity...that's equity.

I'd build a unit on my alley if it wouldn't get me crucified. Literal crucifixion. Right there in the alley. Boom, end o' me.

I am also holding my old crappy house down by DU as a rental - that's my hedge in case I want to scrape myself a McMansion someday. But if I had fourplex zoning, it would start to look awfully tempting to go build a small project on that (rather large) lot...

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by laniroj

We often forget that up until the crazy administrative growth of permitting starting in the 90's, normal folks used to develop stuff all the time. Some row homes on an end block, a mom and pop shopping center, etc etc. Development doesn't have to be reserved for the sophisticated money, we could open it up to the average American household if we wanted to. Talk about equity...that's equity.

This. One million percent this. It's weird how people, especially on the right, are totally okay with this level of bureaucracy.

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

This. One million percent this. It's weird how people, especially on the right, are totally okay with this level of bureaucracy.

I don't think those on the right necessarily are ok with this, but this problem exists in places where people on the right essentially have no say in government...it also exists in red places, but to a far lesser extent and severity.

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by Arapahoe

lol, love it. Do people really think there is plentiful AND cheap land in any city of merit? So absurd -- that doesn't mean there isn't development opportunity....

There is plentiful and cheap land in some cities. It's not mutually exclusive - nice cities and affordable land. The question isn't whether there is development opportunity or not, the question is does our development meet the needs of our population? If you think it does then that's your prerogative, but many millions of American households disagree with that comfortable perspective - like...such... as...the 1/3 of households paying more than 30% of their total income toward housing or the almost 10% of households paying 50%+ toward housing.

Don't get me wrong, someone making $30k isn't entitled to live in a highly desirable and expensive place, but they should be entitled to pursuit of the American dream which includes access to housing where they can earn a damn living.

[mhays]

Did TakeFive just argue that the existence of housing construction means development sites are plentiful and affordable?

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by mhays

Did TakeFive just argue that the existence of housing construction means development sites are plentiful and affordable?

Many, many people make that argument. You would not believe how many people show up at zoning hearings and point out all the construction and "their favorite site where this project should go".

That said I do appreciate TakeFive pointing out all those developments.

[Arapahoe]

Originally Posted by laniroj

Ken suggests, allow tri/four plex on every lot and meaningfully upzone (quickly) large swaths of transit corridors and arterials. This would help make available more land for development to more developers, including non-traditional developers who don't need a maze of administrative expertise and financial horsepower to navigate a complex zoning/permitting system for large projects. Permitting houses is easy...real easy comparatively. This kind of change has the effect of opening up more land for more diverse development options AND allowing for more people to develop housing.

that makes sense, but I wonder what it takes to get a wide-scale zoning change? The McMansion might not want a tri-plex next door, but who cares.

Interestingly enough, the slot homes that Denver banned previously were pretty affordable. Seems like the aesthetic issue could be fixed with just ensuring the the street facing facade looked like a normal frontage.

[Agent Orange]

Definitely dig Ken's suggestion of fourplex minimum zoning, though we should take a lesson from Minneapolis' experience and couple the upzoning with abolishing parking minimums and reducing set backs/increasing FAR limits. Their triplex reform has apparently produced very few units because of the many other limitations imposed by the zoning/land use code.

If we're talking wish lists though - I'd like to see higher density above fourplex on corner lots and near transit stations/high frequency bus routes. I'm curious if laniroj could speculate on what the economics of small one/two lot apartment buildings might be if zoning and parking rules allowed them. I'm thinking of all the 3 story walk up apartment buildings you see from the 40s-60s in Central Denver. Those provide some unobtrusive density and housing type diversity to SFH dominated neighborhoods (because let's be real, each unit in a 4-plex in Congress Park or Highland is still gonna be 800k and up).

Could zoning reform make those 12 unit walk ups viable again at a cost competitive with 5-on-1 megablock construction? A modern version of those were built over by 17th and Park back in 2016 or so before the "small lot exemption" was gutted.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by Arapahoe

Seems like the aesthetic issue could be fixed with just ensuring the the street facing facade looked like a normal frontage.

You know what I think will improve aesthetics without onerous new regulations? Competition. When you have hundreds of developable sites, you now have many more competing developers, and buyers will now get choices on what to buy rather than having to pick one one ugly, blocky townhouse with 5 different materials and window sizes, just because it's in their desired neighborhood (and maybe just barely in their budget). Developers that build ugly 🞵🞵🞵🞵 will have to compete with developers that build better looking stuff. Right now, it's a seller's market and that means that people are desperate enough to buy prison-grade architecture just so that they can live on a seedy block just because it's a 1/2 mile of Sloan's Lake.

[CONative]

Might be a longshot...

I'm completing a study for my company. Anyone know where I can get numbers on the national housing shortage and the percentage of that shortage that are affordable single-family homes??

[Arapahoe]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

You know what I think will improve aesthetics without onerous new regulations? Competition. When you have hundreds of developable sites, you now have many more competing developers, and buyers will now get choices on what to buy rather than having to pick one one ugly, blocky townhouse with 5 different materials and window sizes, just because it's in their desired neighborhood (and maybe just barely in their budget). Developers that build ugly 🞵🞵🞵🞵 will have to compete with developers that build better looking stuff. Right now, it's a seller's market and that means that people are desperate enough to buy prison-grade architecture just so that they can live on a seedy block just because it's a 1/2 mile of Sloan's Lake.

I hear we are short 20-30 thousand homes, so not likely you can get choosy without someone getting an offer in on anything that is somewhat affordable.

[The Dirt]

30k shortage in Denver proper. I heard 3-5 million nationally.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

I'd build a unit on my alley if it wouldn't get me crucified. Literal crucifixion. Right there in the alley. Boom, end o' me.

I am also holding my old crappy house down by DU as a rental - that's my hedge in case I want to scrape myself a McMansion someday. But if I had fourplex zoning, it would start to look awfully tempting to go build a small project on that (rather large) lot...

Ahh, I wondered what happen to that DU property. I used to date a gal (briefly) that lived in similar one-story place near DU.

I can identify with a lot of this

Originally Posted by laniroj

We often forget that up until the crazy administrative growth of permitting starting in the 90's, normal folks used to develop stuff all the time. Some row homes on an end block, a mom and pop shopping center, etc etc. Development doesn't have to be reserved for the sophisticated money, we could open it up to the average American household if we wanted to. Talk about equity...that's equity.

But honestly the good ole days (which I clearly remember) were not as idyllic as you seem to suggest.

I may have previously mentioned (but short memories) that I'm familiar with boatloads of 3, 4 & 5-plexes. Most of them in So Aurora and Centennial (especially along Arapahoe Rd) had a front brick 1st story with (usually) double-car garages in the back where there was a drive between complexes. They were called Townhomes; what a concept.

Write Corp, Richmond and (I think) Bill Walters built lots of this stuff. They were actually very nice. But the magic was they bought lower cost land (zoned for multi-family) on large sites where they could efficiently pack in the units. One complex in the DTC didn't use brick but while not high end they were very nice - think location, location, location.

There was only a small number of independent builders who built one-off fourplexes in areas less attractive because the land costs were so low.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by laniroj

As pertains housing, you're not wrong as to the level of activity but I don't look to one or ten or fifty projects to validate my beliefs on housing - that's what we call confirmation bias IMO.

When I think of confirmation bias I think of propaganda from the left or the right that loves to use correlation whether relevant or not. They also love to conflate different issues.

Rather, I look at data and interpret the objective result.

People are rarely objective and they misuse data constantly. For example, they'll use general data that says little about your area of focus and be misleading as a result.

To Bunt's point, we also don't produce it necessarily where people "want" to be...

Yes, I mentioned to mhays that many decades ago it was proclaimed that "they're not making any more land" and rather than being a smart-🞵🞵🞵 response it really goes to the heart of reality for Denver neighborhoods.

We could open the floodgates so to speak with what Ken suggests, allow tri/four plex on every lot and meaningfully upzone (quickly) large swaths of transit corridors and arterials. This would help make available more land for development to more developers...

It won't even come close to the panacea you're envisioning.

Take a 'crummy' or 'small' home site in (pick your neighborhood) Wash Park or two places next to each other (or two or three sites) and it may be possible to build a fourplex and I'd be fine with that; they could easily look better than what is replaced

But you also complained about the high cost of construction; that applies also to fourplexes, likely even worse. So forget about attaining any significant degree of affordability but is four units better than one? Sure, where you can find something that can at least pencil at strong rents. May I suggest that won't be as easy as you think?

I used to think West Wash Park was ideal for upzoning but then I recalled those that lived there that I used to play volleyball with. They were like guard dogs and mama bears in protecting their 'hood.

I mean really, seriously

Can you see bunt being his own general contractor? He'd probably be out there with a slide rule trying to figure out why there's water bubbling up in various places.

It would be like whistling in the dark.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by Agent Orange

If we're talking wish lists though - I'd like to see higher density above fourplex on corner lots and near transit stations/high frequency bus routes. I'm curious if laniroj could speculate on what the economics of small one/two lot apartment buildings might be if zoning and parking rules allowed them. I'm thinking of all the 3 story walk up apartment buildings you see from the 40s-60s in Central Denver.

Could zoning reform make those 12 unit walk ups viable again at a cost competitive with 5-on-1 megablock construction? A modern version of those were built over by 17th and Park back in 2016 or so before the "small lot exemption" was gutted.

I've stated numerous times that upzoning along major transit routes makes all the sense in the world.

I wouldn't personally be fond of those "outside walk-ups" generally but perhaps in some areas.

And (again) in areas like Virginia Vale or U-Hills you'd be more likely to accomplish much more due the more reasonable costs of homes/land. But nowhere that's considered desirable in Denver will the land costs be cheap. I'm also assuming we're not looking for energy-totally inefficient clap-trap construction.

[SirLucasTheGreat]

I do not think that I have seen anyone post about this yet. Not surprised to see D'baca as the only one voting against this designation.

Former Denver Post printing facility officially ‘blighted,’ paving the way for massive redevelopment in Globeville



https://denverite.com/2021/11/29/former-...for-massive-redevelopment-in-globeville/

[COtoOC]

I've wondered if cities like Denver have a housing shortage (and high prices) because they grew too fast. Meaning, home building just couldn't keep up with the pace of population growth for decades, which results in high prices and not enough housing.

Compared to cities that had a more steady population increase over the decades (KC Metro for instance) and home building was better able to keep up with the slower demand.

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by The Dirt

...Right now, it's a seller's market and that means that people are desperate enough to buy prison-grade architecture just so that they can live on a seedy block just because it's a 1/2 mile of Sloan's Lake.

Prison Grade Architecture. My new favorite one liner. Maximum or minimum security though?