H-Town Man

5 hours ago, SMU1213 said:

I would actually argue that they made it harder for future highrise development in Midtown because The Drewery's rents are so low. Their effective rents are low enough that developers would struggle to make a podium development underwrite, much less a high rise. Also, they haven't been able to get past 65% occupied even with their low rents. 

The Travis is a much better story for Midtown.

Their rents are probably low due to the pandemic and will go up afterwards, if it ever ends. 

On 5/5/2021 at 7:34 PM, hindesky said:

I'm going to say I doubt it. You have 3 restaurants next door and 3 or 4 more at GRB. Footprint on the building is tiny.

In most cities, a park like DG would support 20-30 eateries within walking distance, assuming there's any tourism at all. When Block 100 gets developed, it goes from layup to slam dunk.

On 5/5/2021 at 6:36 PM, kennyc05 said:

Is there gfr in these apartments.

Pretty sure there's something, otherwise it wouldn't have qualified for the DLI incentive.

He expanded the boundaries of highrise development in Midtown and future development will be made easier because of it. What he was trying to do - build a bunch of towers between Main and Fannin as if it were Post Oak Boulevard, in an area where solitary figures roam carrying paper bags of who-knows-what - would have been close to a miracle. Doing this during the pandemic when virtually every urban highrise is becoming a distressed property no matter how well located proved to be impossible.

3 minutes ago, X.R. said:

I thought this is a typical business model for most residential real estate firms. Buy land, build, lease out the retail to anchor tenant, get a certain % of rooms leased, and then sell. So not really big news? 

Combined with the foreclosure on the rest of their property though?

1 minute ago, TheSirDingle said:

I'm betting it goes for around $120-$145 million. Also it seems like they're still going foward with the rest of the development 

 

Does Biv really know something or is he just regurgitating old information?

That low muttering you hear right now is a bunch of Houston developers saying, "Hope you enjoyed your time in America. Rook."

13 hours ago, Tumbleweed_Tx said:

The Rustic seems to be doing ok. But then again, the only time I have been there was for a private event last week, and it was packed. Events are where these places make their money, not from shows and restaurants.

The Rustic is not even comparable to this in land value. Land over there is worth maybe $40-50/SF, a tenth of this. That is why the Rustic is located where it is, in the back of everything, because you couldn't put something like that anywhere else downtown. It is not a question of whether something will do well here. Anything would do well. It's a question of whether it will do well enough to return the cost of the land plus the cost of whatever you build on it. At this location, it will take a very tall building to do that.

24 minutes ago, KirbyDriveKid said:

Actually, Tolkien preferred to use "dwarves"

 

:)

Hahaha, but only as a plural noun...

8 minutes ago, Nate99 said:

 

It's insane that the Burj dwarfs the Eiffel tower by that much.

If we get something like Texas Live!, it would be at the bottom of a very tall building. There is no way something like that would be feasible on $400-500/SF land.

9 hours ago, phillip_white said:

Agreed. If they wanted to take it all down, why not just come out swinging?

Is the bodega still open? That would be a major hint as to whether or not it will be demolished anytime soon. Also, technically the southeast building would be coming down... just not completely if they leave the facade (fingers crossed). 

They don't own the bodega building, which is also a hint that they won't be demolishing it.

14 hours ago, Houston19514 said:

I hear what you're saying, but to be fair, public entities had little to do with the Embassy Suites.  On the other hand, public entities were much more heavily involved with both the Hilton Americas and the Marriott Marquis.

Like I said, it took public entities to get the ball rolling, as was the case with the convention center, its hotels, and the park. But public entities had a lot to do with the Embassy Suites, because the tax incentives given out made it feasible to construct a building for which the land value was otherwise too high. If no tax incentives were given out, it would have required a bigger, nicer building to make the project feasible given the land cost.

That's the tradeoff when you push development forward with tax incentives, rebates, etc. It makes buildings with a lower return feasible, so you get lesser buildings.

2 hours ago, Nate99 said:

Dang, I thought it came up as being city owned a while back as well. 

The best way to ensure that this gets developed to its highest and best use is for it to remain in private hands. He will sell it when he believes its value is maximized, and when that happens, a developer will be forced to build something very big in order to get an adequate return to the land. When public entities get involved is when you end up with stuff like the Embassy Suites, although it did require public investment to get the ball rolling in this neighborhood (but we are past that stage).

On 4/30/2021 at 5:40 PM, Houston19514 said:

Hmmm... Interesting.  i had thought the City owned that whole super-block. Didn't they issue an RFP for development on that site a few years back?

HCAD shows it owned by Louis Macey (who goes under the name "Current Owner") since I think around 2011. It may have been the city's before that, didn't dig into the sales history of all the parcels. They still may have been in a position to issue an RFP if they had a ground lease agreement, although it would be unusual for the city to be the lessee on a ground lease. 

On 4/28/2021 at 1:29 PM, Nate99 said:

Can confirm. They're putting in a few drains and the rebar for curbing is being placed now.  

Maybe the city can part with the block behind the Marquis after this is up and running. 

If you mean Block 100, that is owned by Louis Macey. He'll sell it when he's good and ready.

3 hours ago, astrohip said:

I asked him about that (he was on break, and we had a 5-10 minute conversation on all sorts of things--such as I started working there before he was born). He knew exactly what I was talking about. He said those beams were in bad shape, and were not really usable beams any more. Old, dried out, falling apart. I'll probably go back next week and see if I can check them out personally.

That may be the case but you always have to take this with a grain of salt. The normal Houston mentality is that anything old is "in bad shape, falling apart." Up in the Northeast there are brick warehouses all over the place that have heavy wooden beams and they are in use, not dried out and falling apart. You would think a humid climate like in Houston would help this sort of thing. Then again, we do have formosan termites that could have gotten to those beams. But it's just hard to trust when this excuse has been used so many times, and our city has a really low IQ in general when it comes to historic building methods.

On 11/14/2020 at 5:43 PM, hindesky said:

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/real-estate/article/University-of-Houston-Downtown-breaks-ground-on-15723297.php#photo-20253633

 

 

Glad they are finally recognizing the Jawas and all they have contributed to student diversity.

On 4/23/2021 at 9:00 AM, astrohip said:

Yeah, those renderings definitely made it look like it was to be saved.

I would love to have some of those old timbers. Make great landscape timbers. I'll have to drive by on Monday when I'm back in town and see what's going on.

Thanks for the updates @hindesky.

Timbers like that have not lost any strength and could easily be used in another building. There are timber framers in Texas who would love something like that.

1 hour ago, Houston19514 said:

Seems unlikely.  BBP's master plan does not appear to go that far east and that is probably all pretty active Port of Houston property.

It is just east of where their plan ends... and the historical value of those buildings is pretty considerable, as that is the only place where the Port of Houston resembled something of a traditional port post-ship channel. Those buildings and the bars for the workers along 75th Street (all demolished) figured into Sig Byrd's writings about "port characters."

But you are right that it is pretty active Port of Houston property.

Has BBP ever said anything about trying to do something with the few remaining wharf buildings around the Turning Basin? The ones on the right bank along Peavey Drive and Foster Street were all demolished over the past 20 years or so but there are still a few remaining on the left bank. I imagine this is insanely expensive land though since it is on the ship channel.

On 4/22/2021 at 3:06 AM, Urbannizer said:

Anyone have access? 

https://www.costar.com/article/1085605325/new-mixed-income-housing-project-to-kick-off-transformation-of-buffalo-bayou-east

Highlights:

Nonprofit Buffalo Bayou Partnership and Brinshore Development are planning the first phase of what is to be a 350-unit residential community in the city's East End off of Lockwood Drive near Tony Marron Park.

The project, called Lockwood South, would include a mix of multifamily and single-family homes with market-rate and some affordably priced units as well as senior housing. Groundbreaking on the 80-unit first phase is slated for the third quarter, with completion at the end of 2022.

Since revealing its master plan in late 2019, the nonprofit group has been busy planning several projects and raising funds for development, including designing improvements for Japhet Creek, Turkey Bend and Tony Marron Park and starting work on the residential portion of Lockwood South.

Buffalo Bayou Partnership and Brinshore Development received a green light from the city of Houston’s planning commission April 15 on a variance request needed to move forward with the first phase of Lockwood South, which includes building 80 residential units. About 10% to 15% of those units could be market-rate apartments, Rosenberg said, but it depends on funding rules.

Surrounding the residential project, Buffalo Bayou Partnership is adding 9 acres of green space and expanding Tony Marron Park to 43 acres — putting the park just 600 feet away from Lockwood South residences, Rosenberg said. Those expanded parks are expected to be open with phase one of the residential units in December 2022. The second phase of the project, with additional residences and senior living, could open six to 12 months later, he added, so sometime in 2023 or thereafter.

Buffalo Bayou Partnership has also earmarked a section of the project for a small mixed-use commercial site such as a clinic or co-op grocery store, Rosenberg said. The partnership is constructing a new street to connect Lockwood Drive to Drenner Street.

Elsewhere in the East End, the Houston City Council on April 13 approved a 400-unit affordable housing project at 800 Middle St. near the bayou, the Houston Chronicle reported. The project, a partnership between the city and NRP Group, would replace Clayton Homes, a housing complex the Texas Department of Transportation plans to demolish to make way for its expansion of Interstate 45. Eventually the city, in partnership with NRP Group, envisions having market-rate apartments on-site for a total of 900 units, according to media reports.

24 minutes ago, astrohip said:

The small structure on the roof is the top of a freight elevator. This thing was huuuuge, probably 20x20, or larger. Another weird factoid: both floors of the brick structure building are wood. Huge beams of wood, maybe 12"x12". They date back to the original construction in the 1920s, when it was built by Houston Sash & Door.

That is great, Houston has hardly any heavy timber warehouse buildings, which are all over the Northeast. But if they add three floors to this building as shown in the rendering, I'm not sure if that internal structure will be kept.

8 hours ago, Triton said:

Then you're not reading the numbers. The economy is most definitely booming and most businesses right now can't keep up with the demand... we are seeing a near record number of 7.4 million job openings.  Forget the government's antics of pumping in billions... People are ready to get out and enjoy life post-covid. You saw nearly 1 million jobs added last month. At our start-up, Joyride.com, we are getting an unprecedented amount of trips just in the past month because people are beginning to actually travel again. Look at the price of oil. The economy is taking off whether it stands in line with certain political views or not... it was due to take off because of the pent-up demand, no matter who became president. I seriously see a lot of projects that were postponed during 2020 due to Covid will come back this year or next.

 

Here are some high frequency indicators because facts matter...

 

Hotel occupancy is skyrocketing upwards:

 

Seating at restaurants:

 

Gasoline supplied is coming back up to 2019 levels:

 

 

 

 

 

Yes, people are ready to get out and enjoy life. So what? There are still way fewer people than normal out and enjoying life, although Texas is close to normal due to lax restrictions. The fact that the economy is better than it was prior to the pandemic is due to the volume of cash added. You showed me a bunch of graphs that should indicate an economy getting back to where it was, not soaring past it. Certain political views? I don't see this as a political issue.