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Holiday Inn Express/Staybridge Suites Hotel At 1319 Texas Ave.


downtownian

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Nothing to report here but was walking by the building today and thought it would make an excellent loft conversion (image below). 500 Crawford (apartments at ballpark development) is two blocks to the east and the downtown development map shows a 28-story residential building by Marquette Land going up one block to the east. If this building converted to lofts, it would make for three consecutive blocks of residential. The ground floor of the building looks like its perfect for retail.

 

However, there are major structural issues with the property and it was almost demolished in 2009:

 

"It could cost $4.7 million to resolve the warehouse's structural issues, according to an August 2008 engineering report. "The problem with the [Hogan-Allnoch] building is that the brick is load-bearing brick," Ellwood says. "Unfortunately, with the settling of the earth, the building basically has been compromised. There are pretty substantial cracks going all the way from the bottom to the top." http://www.preservationnation.org/magazine/2009/todays-news/houston-spares-two-buildings.html

 

The building is four stories and 50,000 square feet. Assuming that just the top three stories are converted to residential, the structural costs would be $125 / square foot before updating and interior improvements. My estimate of the all-in 1111 Rusk conversion is ~$230 / square foot. I'm not familiar with the costs of residential conversions but am wondering if this is a viable project if Harris County gave away the building for free and Houston provided Chapter 380 incentives.

 

 

http://www.arch-ive.org/houston/texas1311/hoganallnoch.jpg

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It's a beautiful building, the kind modern faux loft buildings try to look like. A shame about those cracks; in Chicago about 2/3 of the city is load bearing brick and they're doing fine, I wonder if the soil is different.

Who almost tore it down in 2009?

 

Harris County almost demolished the building to make room for 27 parking spaces, which I wish was a joke. Luckily preservationists were able to stop the County's plans. Also, there have been three failed auctions for the building with the most recent in 2010 I believe.

http://www.chron.com/business/sarnoff/article/Historic-downtown-building-can-find-no-love-1697833.php

 

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I wonder if my company is involved in those structural repair estimates. The houston office doesnt do, too much commercial work, but I'm going to forward that link to our sales people and see if there are any opportunities with it...

 

Thanks for sharing. 

 

good luck!

 

I really want to save our history like this. Would be such a cool place to live.

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Harris County almost demolished the building to make room for 27 parking spaces, which I wish was a joke. Luckily preservationists were able to stop the County's plans.

One is tempted to say that county government is run by rednecks, but in almost every "redneck" town I know (Brenham, La Grange, Bastrop, Lockhart, etc.) a building like that would most certainly be saved, cracks or no. Something more sinister lurks here...

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Question: which would be cheaper, to repair the building's structural issues and work from there, or to completely demolish the interior (except for the brick shell) and build an entirely new building, which would maintain the original facade?

 

 

This is a good question. To tell you the truth, it depends.  My background is mainly industrial repairs, but the company does a lot of commercial jobs (just not in the Houston area). 

 

According to the article; The walls are load bearing and brick.  My experience with that system... is limited but makes it more complicated from (my) engineering perspective.  If it were me, I'd stabilize the existing structure with shoring. Then construct a permanent new structural system inside the existing footprint of the building and go from there.  Then remove the shoring (assuming the new structural system holds up the facade). My totally shoot from the hip price without any quantities, schedule, materials or anything--- a couple of million dollars. 

 

Repairing the existing structural component is a different beast. You'll still have to put up shoring. Then after remove components of the brick supports, while shoring everything else dependent on those components. There would probably be a lot of phasing of the repairs etc... Based on a labor component it might be more expensive. 

* Disclaimer: this post is like 95 percent speculative, with 5 percent experience inserted

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According to the article; The walls are load bearing and brick. My experience with that system... is limited but makes it more complicated from (my) engineering perspective. If it were me, I'd stabilize the existing structure with shoring. Then construct a permanent new structural system inside the existing footprint of the building and go from there. Then remove the shoring (assuming the new structural system holds up the facade). My totally shoot from the hip price without any quantities, schedule, materials or anything--- a couple of million dollars.

Repairing the existing structural component is a different beast. You'll still have to put up shoring. Then after remove components of the brick supports, while shoring everything else dependent on those components. There would probably be a lot of phasing of the repairs etc... Based on a labor component it might be more expensive.

* Disclaimer: this post is like 95 percent speculative, with 5 percent experience inserted

Thanks for the reply. I think if you account for the total labor and cost to go from abandoned, structurally unsafe building to lofts ready to move in, it may be cheaper to build anew, especially when you take into account adding new HVAC, plumbing, and electrical systems.

One is tempted to say that county government is run by rednecks, but in almost every "redneck" town I know (Brenham, La Grange, Bastrop, Lockhart, etc.) a building like that would most certainly be saved, cracks or no. Something more sinister lurks here...

I wouldn't say they're "redneck" cities (unless you use redneck and Texas conservative to be interchangeable terms), but in those cases, they would only put up scaffolding to prevent the shell from falling apart and hope that a developer steps in and saves it before weathering damage (as the roof tends to go first, then the floors below) causes the whole thing to collapse in on itself.

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Your question IS a good one, IronTiger. I would like to know the answer as well. Iirc, the old Jeff Davis Hospital off Dart was pretty well gutted inside, but the exterior shell was left pretty well intact, when it was converted.

Considering that building was saved (and God knows it was in baaaaad shape before the rebuild) I think there'd be hope in saving this charming structure. My Lord, JD had parts of the walls collapsing in on itself. This building doesn't appear to be nearly as damaged.

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I wouldn't say they're "redneck" cities (unless you use redneck and Texas conservative to be interchangeable terms), but in those cases, they would only put up scaffolding to prevent the shell from falling apart and hope that a developer steps in and saves it before weathering damage (as the roof tends to go first, then the floors below) causes the whole thing to collapse in on itself.

 

No, I don't think those cities are redneck, which is why I put the term in quotation marks.  But they are rural towns, which to many people is perceived as being redneck.  The point was to say that they are in this respect more civilized than the people in Harris County.  Doing what you suggested they would do is better than proposing it be torn down for parking.

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  • 1 year later...

Just looking at this building I had an idea - probably impractical - could you turn this into a large HEB inside, so that there's only one, maybe two floors, but keep the facade?  Downtown could use a general grocery store like that, just wonder if the structural repairs would be less if you aren't going to be using more than the ground floor.

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Just looking at this building I had an idea - probably impractical - could you turn this into a large HEB inside, so that there's only one, maybe two floors, but keep the facade?  Downtown could use a general grocery store like that, just wonder if the structural repairs would be less if you aren't going to be using more than the ground floor.

 

This block has the Urban League offices as well as a taller county office building and a couple of others if I’m not mistaken.   Someone would really have to like it to want to keep the façade.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just looking at this building I had an idea - probably impractical - could you turn this into a large HEB inside, so that there's only one, maybe two floors, but keep the facade?  Downtown could use a general grocery store like that, just wonder if the structural repairs would be less if you aren't going to be using more than the ground floor.

I'm sure HEB would consider the old grocery store look... great idea by the way

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Anyone have information on this?

 

NOTE* This property is to be sold by Harris County by Sealed-Bid Auction upon receipt of a Letter of Intent for the Minimum Bid or more. Minimum Bid is $2,443,000. Any brokerage commission to be paid by the Buyer.

 

http://www.loopnet.com/xNet/MainSite/Listing/Profile/Profile.aspx?LID=19186875&SRID=5624391794&StepID=101&jli=y

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

1319 Texas Ave.

 

To be sold via sealed bid auction

Bid date: June 15, 2015

Min bid: $2,443,000 ($122k bid deposit)

 

Description: This site is improved with a four story building containing 50,000 SF and an asphalt surface parking lot with 24 spaces.

Road Frontage: 154' along Texas Avenue and 126' along Austin St.

 

Description

50,000 SF 4-stroy building on 19,354 SF of land.(The building requires structural repair and removal of asbestos.) Corner site includes a 24 space asphalt parking lot. Built in 1923, sprinklered, with freight elevator. 

 

http://hcpid.org/row/property/property.htm

 

 

Hogan%20Allnoch%20Building.JPG

 

ff7cce741db24513bf5f79c74ef6889c.jpg

 

http://www.loopnet.com/xNet/MainSite/Listing/Profile/Profile.aspx?LID=19186875&SRID=5715077480&StepID=101

 

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My biz partner and I walked this structure about 2 weeks ago. I hate that it's going to auction because it limits what you can do pre-bid. However, from our cursory inspection, the building doesn't look too sound. There are metal braces holding the brick together in several sections and our idea (convert ground floor into a NYC style fitness lounge with residential above) would be hard to pull off due to lack of parking. The existing asphalt spaces adjacent to the building on Texas Ave. could possibly be dug up and down for a small underground garage/street level garage with a small amenities deck but then the numbers game gets involved and it just doesn't seem worth it.

Edited by KinkaidAlum
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  • 6 months later...

Hogan Allnoch, meet the reaper...

 

J4e1pDY.jpg

 

fie3pYy.jpg

 

I talked to the driver of the semi-truck in the second picture. They were offloading wooden mats to protect the sidewalk from the tracks of the excavator in the first picture. It will be reducing the building to rubble shortly.

 

Anyone have any other info?

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