Showing posts with label High Rise Site for Sale. Show all posts
Showing posts with label High Rise Site for Sale. Show all posts

Tuesday 2 June 2015

Wood Micro Apartments?



Economics dictates that you should build your development with wood framing if the building code lets you - unless a buyer will pay the required extra $100+ per square foot to live in the perceived solidity and safety of concrete construction.

After all, will anyone really care once the plasterboard has been set?

Recent evidence shows that the home buyer in Canada will live in smaller quarters in concrete buildings, but can the current 'micro-sized apartment' movement find opportunity in a wood framed building?

The question is a cultural history one.

In downtown Melbourne, Australia, there is one of the tallest modern timber buildings in the world (10 floors) and no one seemed to mind when the sales began. In Canada, though - a land established on tales of tall timber, it can be a concern.

Evenings toasting marshmallows in front of the campfire may not have helped the timber industry. Is it possible that deep in the Canadian psyche everybody knows: wood burns. More than that - there is a lot of it in British Columbia and like any supply and demand scenario, that makes it seem less valuable.

Add to this the bad press of the leaky mould producing four storey wood frame buildings of the nineties and wood is fighting a huge battle for equality.

In Canada the government has pushed back some, calling for wood to be a major component in any public building. Here, 'Cross Laminated Timber' and 'Laminated Veneer Lumber' known as mass timber construction is doing well to bring solidity to the wood debate.

However, in the developer's world (where the coal mine canary lives), the question for micro-apartments and wood framed buildings remains: "If you build it, will they come?"

The answer may lie in mass timber panels and prefabrication, where computer driven accuracy and fine detail resolution can bring a renewed opportunity to express the beauty of wood.

Saturday 2 March 2013

The Magic Number is 7142

How do you encourage pioneering development?

High density may all make sense when you study the population, the surrounding facilities and the travel to work times, it is even environmentally sound, but how do you get the 'risk adverse developer' to look your way?

Well, at Delta in British Columbia, the City team have come up with a fascinating new strategy. Make life EASIER for developers. I know you will be a little confused by this concept, but its true.


BYLAW 7142 front page





































 

The new Bylaw 7142 has three big incentives for the boys who like to build over thirty storeys high:
  •  Property Tax exemptions for three years (can amount to over $2M in savings)
  • 80 percent reduction in DCC's (Development Cost Charges)
  • Waiver of building permit, plumbing permit and land use application municipal fees
Clearly, the Corporation of Delta is "open for business".  

Saturday 19 January 2013

In the end it is all about absorbtion speed

When you reach the speed of sound you hear a large bang or 'sonic boom'...called breaking the sound barrier, then again at mach two (twice the speed of sound). In real estate this is called selling off the plan...and it can be fast.

This assembly of property expecting to be rezoned for up to 7 :1 highrise density in the downtown core of North Delta, may well be one of those epic storeys of queues at the  display unit and rapid absorbtion.



When I first arrived here, I found that there was very little for seniors (who loved the area); for students (attending Kwantlen University) and young families who needed an easy commute either by bus or car to Vancouver (and be close to Costco). The bus interchange is opposite the site.

Local families rave about the safety and convenience of being close to Safeway, London Drugs AND the Cinema. With three Starbucks within walking distance it is already a true urban community meeting place.


This sketch is a visual aid to show one way to manage the interestingly shaped site, but you will need a locally registered BC Architect to capture your vision for the rezoning.

Do call me, if you are interested in the assembled property. At 7:1 FAR it is great value. The City recently approved a high rise at 4.6:1 a few blocks away but what we have here is a true downtown core site.