He would need support from the NCDOT but in this case the city could work with him on that.
from what i remember dartmouth just flows into SFH neighborhoodsā¦easily bikeable(i did it regularly in the 2000ās) from this spot well into the quail hollow areaā¦and not bad for walking either as there are sidewalks on most of the streets, and the streets arent that busy. Eastgate also has a park with tennis courts 1.5 miles away. to me this is ok.
If this has been posted then my apologies. But Kane wants the area at Lassiter at North Hills currently zoned for 12 stories to be brought up to 40.
Kane Realty pitches āmicro-unitsā in exchange for up to 40 stories in North Hills (msn.com)
I was just thinking about how much we lament the parking decks at North hills (they do suck). But I would take them any day over this type of development. The surface parking to building ratio Iām here is mind boggling. Literally acres for one restaurant.
I approve, itās North Hills, who cares and no less than 40. Start building tomorrow please and thank you.
Ah yes, that is the answer: $1000/mo 600 square foot closets
I would love a 600 sq. ft. closet, so I could display all of my Gucci apparel properly.
more like $1800*
<600 sf Studios at North Hills already run 1500-2200+; you can bet theyāll be pricier in a new build. Making apartments smaller doesnāt really seem to provide much affordability. At least to me, it just seems like developers pocket some extra cash.
Iād have killed for a 600sf studio coming out of college. But I tell myself that living with 5 roommates built character or something.
The costs do scale but not linearly, since the most expensive parts of a residence to build are the kitchen/bath - and even the tiniest studio still has, by definition, both.
Itās also an invalid comparison to assert that itās all profit, given that a North Hills high-rise is a much higher-cost product. You only find tiny apartments in the highest-cost locations, and in the highest-cost buildings (high-rises cost 2X more per square foot to build than low-rise buildings!), because (a) thatās where the cost pressures are highest, (b) thatās where the demand is strongest, and (c) thatās where zoning puts them.
So if the price is 2X higher, but the cost is 1.9X higher, it might be the case that ādevelopers pocket some extra cashā - but itās nowhere near as much as what you think.
Itās also an invalid comparison to assert that itās all profit, given that a North Hills high-rise is a much higher-cost product.
I donāt think Iām understanding your point here or its relevance to my comment. I would assert developers stand to gain profit from micro-units regardless of construction type, and I wasnāt comparing pricing of wood-frame to concrete construction ā I just pulled the first studio apartment rent from North Hills that I could find to show that the ā$1000ā figure I was responding to was completely out of sync with what theseāll go for. I think thatās even more true given the higher cost of high-rises, as youāve pointed out.
Obviously thereās some cost impact to making units smaller, but my point is that micro-units are not a solution to affordability, and I find it disingenuous when developers bill them as such or imply that providing them is a favor to us all when they barely make a dent.
In Durham, a developer promoted āmicro-unitsā as their effort to provide affordable housing to the neighborhood, but the new micro-units are more expensive than most 1 bedroom apartments in the area were (in an apples-to-apples 5-over-1 construction comparison). Those other apartment complexes have now increased rents to approach those of the new build. One could make the argument that rent escalation would be even higher if studios were not being built, but I canāt help but notice that it seems like every time new (smaller) studios pop up, all it does is allow developers to push the needle forward in what they charge per sf. Thereās little effect on affordability for the rest of us.
Well, thereās your comparison, and why looking at face rents alone isnāt looking at the whole picture. The Triangleās highest housing prices are in Chapel Hill, a hotbed of NIMBYism, and itās obviously not a surfeit of new high-rise towers that led to that situation.
Construction costs have escalated substantially over the past few years and the past few decades - double the rate of inflation from 2000-2020. New buildings were far more expensive to build than the things around them, and wouldnāt have been built if they couldnāt rent for more PSF. Smaller unit sizes are offsetting what would otherwise have been much higher prices had unit sizes remained steady.
Of course developers are doing micro-units because theyāre more profitable - thatās how businesses operate. But theyāre addressing a market niche that has existed forever, but was banned by zoning (for very bad, racist and classist reasons) for decades and has only recently been un-banned. As long as it doesnāt hurt anybody, and as long as nobodyās being coerced into signing an apartment lease, whatās the problem?
Can micro-units be more affordable than other alternatives? Yes. Will newly built units that cost several hundred thousand dollars to build be affordable to low-income workers? Not without subsidy.
whatās the problem?
Thereās no problem; I think studios are a very important housing type. I just donāt think they address housing affordability in any significant way, so I dislike when developers present them that way.
Iām an architect; Iām very familiar with escalating construction costs ā every project Iāve worked on is dealing with it. But I donāt think it explains all of the rent increases. Since you seem much more familiar with the developer side of things, Iām curious to hear your read on this scenario:
Two developers purchased land in 2015 for the same cost. Owner A builds a 5-over-1 in 2020 and charges $1400 for a 575sf 1 bedroom. Owner B completes their 5-over-1 in 2022 one block away and charges $1400 for 400sf micro-studios in a building with similar amenities. Is that rent increase explained by construction costs? I see the difference as largely profit-driven because the developer believes the market can support the higher rent, not because the developer is trying to cover the cost of higher investment, which hasnāt increased 44% in two years.
And, yes, of course this is just business and Iām not faulting developers for targeting profitable projects. But my perception ā which may be incorrect ā is that micro-studios increase profit margins for developers, as opposed to maintaining them. Do you believe that developersā profit margins are staying consistent through all of these per sf. rent increases?
But a quick search for 5-over-1 1BRs in downtown Durham shows theyāre now $1500 or $1800, so $1400 is still cheaper. Having signed leases in 2020, market conditions then were incredibly different than today. Prices in general increased 44% or whatever over two years, which is a windfall for everyone who owns land - whether a developer or a homeowner. Yet nobody ever seems to vilify a homeowner who sells for a tremendous profit.
I donāt know the specifics of this micro-unit building, but many include more deluxe amenities and shorter / more flexible lease terms - making a direct comparison more problematic.
One of the confounding problems is that single-family zoning means that micro-units are functionally banned (or rendered economically infeasible) in the areas with lower land prices and lower construction costs so (besides mobile home parks) their potential for actually demonstrating moderate-income affordability will remain unrealized.
I read @elevatoroperatorās scenario as more of a hypothetical one to suit his question: is the relationship between rent increases and construction costs singularly causal? That probably means we should assume both buildings are targeting the same market (equal quality of deluxe amenities, similar lease terms etc.).
ā¦though I guess thatās another interesting point: because the two years since lockdowns have changed the multifamily real estate market so much, developers are playing catchup to address new demand from transplants/investors for fancier homes and existing demand to make up for housing supply shortages. Both of those needs are separate (but interconnected).
This would be a huge undertaking, but I think worth discussingā¦
For six forks at NH: A road diet and induced lower speeds by narrowing lanes and grade separating bike paths, eliminate left turns and cross-traffic at Dartmouth, and put an elongated roundabout at Lassiter Mill to eliminate all Red Lights except for a pedestrian crosswalk signal. Encourage drivers to walk while visiting NH, but keeping N-S traffic moving. Let the chips fall where they may
Six Forks with narrower lanes! Thatās a choice I suppose.
I canāt say Iāve ever driven from the 440 interchange through Lassiter Mill Rd. in less than 3 minutes because of red lights. Narrow lanes, slow speeds, and take out the red lights. Cars will move through in the same amount of time and pedestrians will be able to navigate the environment.
This is a classic stroad conundrum-- too complex to be a road, but too high-speed and wide to be a street. I think we would all agree that Six Forks at NH should be a street.
You canāt fix a single stroad in isolation. Gotta look at the whole network. Narrow lanes in this location are safer and more effective than wide lanes.
The Six Forks study of old was trying to do this while also trying to navigate some of the sticking points around the way things have been developed. Iām all for it - median, lane / road diet, expanded (ā¦and expensive! right of way acquisition for multi-use pathā¦) although, I can envision plenty of folx struggling with a multi-lane roundabout at LassiterāOh the horrorā to drop off younglings at St Timothyās!!!
However, to your point about narrow lanes ā certainly not on its own ā some of the narrowest lanes in town are along the stretch of Wake Forest northbound from the Beltline to Old Wake Forest and man, if you havenāt in a while, you should roll up north to investigateā¦Letās just say, the chips fall oftenā¦
Iām not sure we can ālimitā Six Forks and Falls / Wake Forest and Atlantic in the midst of all the development growth in these areas and still functionally move people throughā¦and thatās the rub to get to where we want to go and to get to how we wish it would feelā¦
Well before the Six Forks Plan even gestated, Kane approached the city of Raleigh in 2007 for a tax increment financing plan for the planned parking structures at North Hills East. He was going to sweeten the deal with a pedestrian sky bridge over Six Forks. But, that idea has disappeared over time.