I believe that they got the property rezoned to 40 stories. That’s when they stopped work on the ASR approval.
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I think the cynicism isn’t entirely warranted here. Speculators don’t pay millions of dollars to design several towers and pursue approval with the city, and they don’t put out leasing documents for projects that aren’t real. My understanding is that this project was pretty far into the process; it wasn’t just a loose concept. Hell, they even had the website up for the condo building which was prepping for pre-sales.
Obviously, it went off the rails somewhere in the approval process, followed by deteriorating financial conditions and then a new post-COVID market that probably tempted them to go for bigger return on the site and rethink some things. But it’s pretty clear to me that this developer did not just buy this land with the intent to sit on it and sell – they were well on their way to delivering.
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No office demand. Luxury rental getting over saturated, condo construction loans almost impossible to obtain. Some investors may end up being bag holders on this land. No guarantee that land values go up in downtown Raleigh.
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Land values downtown are down probably 20-30% from peak right now. This land is probably worth a little more than they paid for it 6 year ago but not by very much.
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There is no data to support this
When The Platform and 400H open up later this year we may see slower lease rates, but then again there isn’t any data to say lux rentals are “over saturated”.
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…hopefully slower rental rate increases the next few years, too 
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Did you forget something? What about Cary or Chatham County? How is the market better there?
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It is challenging CRE market. That is why the Nash Hotel dropped the hotel and became almost 400 rental units. I work 100% remote and will never go back to office. I went by for in person meeting two months ago.
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The downtown of luxury housing has a nice ring to it.
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Agree to disagree. I lived 14 years in the Paramount and loved it. Down sized to retire and consult. Walked to work downtown Raleigh and walked to Mojoes, Mellow Mushroom, and Sullivans. Wake County and the SE United States is still the place to be. Yes, Raleigh is slowing down. Single family permits are down 19% from year ago per TBJ but that is temporary.
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I hope to live in a world one day where SFH permits isn’t the de facto metric for growth/success.
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SFH permits are not everything but indicate the health of the overall economy in the area. Advance Auto which is headquartered at North Hills has seen sales declines. Do you think anyone working there worried they might get laid off is going to buy a house or have one built?
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Housing maybe, but a SFH metric? …absolutely not.
At this point, all DTR lovers maybe lucky that this project has not started. With the problems commercial/office space is facing, and the changing zoning rules with Raleigh, the timing feels off. I was just reading that HOK’s big residential building in downtown Austin has dropped from 80 floors to 40 some - as a result of both the changing economics/costs and push back from the city’s appearance commission. As I am fond of saying, I think this is the most important block downtown, with its ability to link the Warehouse District with Fayetteville St and the east side. It is also, in my mind, ideally suited for a signature building. I will be fine with something well designed that doesn’t push the upper limits in height, if it activates the streetscape and works to stitch disparate parts of our small downtown together.
Happy Independence days to everyone.
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Yeah, it just WFH change everything I think, butts in chairs at the office are going to be different forever. I just don’t see us returning to normal. It looks slim now I want to see Austin’s appearance commission and see how it compares to Raleigh.
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The opportunity now is for city centers to become urban neighborhoods: something Raleigh has frankly been slowly building for the last 2 decades.
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There are some industries that will always need in-person work, such as mine. Unfortunately, biotech companies seem to love suburban car dependent office parks.
I am excited for the ‘RTP Hub’ but doubt it will move the needle on new lab space.
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Don’t biotech companies need huge floorplates? I feel like their buildings I’ve seen in Cambridge, Mass. and Cambridge, England tend to be long and low even if you are supposed to take the T/bus there.
Nope. There are reasons* you won’t see labs in highrises but they can totally fit in an urban form. The Chesterfield building in DT Durham is a lab space in the interior btw.
*Lab space needs a lot of extra plumbing and ductwork. Hoods, vacuum systems, gas, better ventilation. Once a building has been used as a lab it can’t really be used as anything else. The floors tend to be higher to support the extra infrastructure. Also, would YOU want to live in a ‘luxury apartment’ that might have suspicious chemicals left over from GSK/KBI/BASF’s nefarious schemes?
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