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Twin Cities condo market strong, says new report

Sam Black
Staff reporter

More than 2,100 new condos will be introduced in the Twin Cities in 2004, more than the units developed in the nine years combined, according to a report published this week by Dahlgren, Shardlow and Uban Inc. (DSU) in Minneapolis.

Despite the "gold rush" of condo development that the Twin Cities is experiencing, DSU predicts there's still room for growth long term.

The overall Twin Cities condo market is still trying to catch up with market demand, and so there's considerable volatility, in terms of pricing changes, new projects and product absorption rates.

Over the next few years, the market will settle into a more mature stage, where developers merely respond to year-by-year growth in the growth in the underlying consumer base.

"In many respects, 2005 could be a 'make or break' year for condos in the Twin Cities," the report said.

The depth of the market will be tested in Downtown Minneapolis. Between 2005 and 2007, construction is expected to begin on 5,100 new units in more than 40 condo projects planned or under construction there.

But DSU estimates that about 500 new condo units will be absorbed in downtown by the end of 2004. That number should rise between 750 and 1,000 in 2005 as more inventory becomes available.

The volume of construction is creating new sub-districts in downtown, such as Elliot Park, Loring Park, the Warehouse District and Washington Avenue near the mill ruins. Each has unique competition for builders and benefits for buyers, according to the report.

This is the first time DSU has issued a condo market report. The firm's two-year old market research division is led by Thomas O'Neil, director of market research.

The 18-page report shows that prices for new condos in the Twin Cities increased 10 percent annually between 1999 and 2003, based on sales through the Regional Multiple Listing Service (MLS). On a per-square-foot basis, the condos have increased from about $150 per square foot to $220 per square foot since the end of 1999.

Downtown Minneapolis is the highest-priced submarket, with average prices for new condos hitting $271 per square foot this year. Prices don't include data from all condo sales, however, because many projects bypass the MLS and are sold directly by developers, report said.

Retro metro: New condo buildings adhering to old architecural styles

Retro metro: New condo buildings adhering to old architecural styles
Linda Mack
Star Tribune
Published November 14, 2004

Advice to architects building new condos in a Minneapolis neighborhood:

Stick to the tried and true -- fake brick, wrought-iron fencing, gable roofs, turrets that recall a long-ago era.

At least that's what a chorus of first-rank architects and developers advise after running the gantlet of neighborhood and city approvals.

"It would be so much easier and so tempting to do that," said Tom Meyer of Meyer, Scherer & Rockcastle.

The firm's all-glass design for Parc Centrale, a 21-story "Vancouver-style" residential tower in Loring Park, went down in flames this fall after a slew of neighbors opposed the height. It has redesigned the project as a six-story building inspired by the nearby classical Loring Park Office Building.

Meanwhile, on downtown's southern edge, the tradition-inspired Grant Park rises from its base of turreted brick townhouses to its limestone crown. A gazebo and white picket fences plucked straight from Disneyland grace its side yard.

With such backward-looking design dominating the landscape, inquiring minds want to know: Is Minneapolis ready for modernism?

Two big cultural projects -- Jean Nouvel's Guthrie Theater and Jacques Herzog's Walker Art Center addition -- certainly will elevate the profile of contemporary architecture in Minneapolis when they open. But just below that level is a safer and much more banal landscape.

"We've been really timid," said Michael Lander of the Lander Group, who has been a leader in such New Urbanist developments as Excelsior and Grand in St. Louis Park and the North Quadrant in St. Paul.

There are reasons for the timidity, many developers and architects agree. The housing market is conservative by nature. That and a city approval process that favors neighborhood input tend to dampen edgier design.

"How hard is it to get this new stuff approved?" asked developer Chuck Leer, who's worked in the city's North Loop. "Some of us won't even go down that road because we know how hard it is."

A look at some current proposals highlights the hazards.

A slow process

Architect James Dayton, who came to Minneapolis eight years ago from Frank Gehry's office in California, wanted to design a new loft building that was simple, direct and industrial-looking. After renovating a classic brick warehouse on N. 3rd Street into the Bookmen Lofts, he designed an edgier new eight-story building across the street. His Bookmen Stacks, with exposed concrete and glass and a zinc-clad base, is going up now, but the process leading to construction was neither quick nor easy.

The project was not in a historic district but, Dayton said, city planning staff suggested using brick and wrought iron. "They literally asked, 'Why can't you just use normal materials?' " he said.

Last month the third phase of the project, a modernist one-story restaurant in the middle of the block, was approved. The painstaking negotiations took two years.

Developer Kit Richardson, who also has been active in the North Loop, envies the straightforward industrial look of Dayton's Bookmen Stacks. He proposed exposing the concrete structure of the new 710 Lofts on N 4th St., but city planners insisted brick be used on the main facades.

"It looks like a historic replica," Richardson said. "I would have liked it to be all concrete and glass. I just think it's too bad it's not honestly expressed."

Did he consider appealing?

"When you contest, there's no guarantee that you'll win, and you aren't sure how much time it will take. We had people waiting to move in," he said.

Neighbors object

It's perhaps not surprising that neighbors shot down Parc Centrale, the proposed 21-story tower on a site in Loring Park that's zoned for six stories.

Minneapolis City Council member Lisa Goodman, who represents the area, said the project's height was the problem, not its contemporary look.

But developer Clark Gassen and architect David Graham of Elness Swenson Graham ran into a similar firestorm on the Edgewater project on the corner of E. Calhoun Parkway and W. Lake Street, the current site of a four-story 1920s brick apartment building. Their proposed contemporary design, a six-story glass-and-Kasota-stone condo, is hardly cutting-edge.

To address neighbors' concerns that the building was "a glass box," Graham revised the original design to shrink the amount of glass and include more stone.

Although the City Planning Commission overwhelmingly approved the project as appropriate for the zoning and location on a busy traffic corridor, neighbors appealed to the City Council.

Vicki Fraher, one of the neighbors, said both the height and the design are objectionable.

"The concern is that the homes on that block are very, very traditional, so it's out of context," she said in a phone interview.

The project squeaked by the Zoning and Planning Committee on a 3-to-3 vote, sending it onto the full Minneapolis City Council, which approved the project 6 to 5. Graham and Fraher agreed on one thing: The process was "excruciating."

"You don't know what anyone really thinks until you get to the meeting," said Graham. "It would have been a lot easier if we had rolled over and done a Tudor Revival with a turret."

On the glassy side

A handful of developers and architects have taken a more modern tack and lived to tell about it.

Architect Julie Snow's designs for the Humboldt Lofts, which combine glass, rusty steel and brick, and the straightforward Park Avenue Lofts in the Minneapolis Mills District have managed to be thoroughly modern and win approval in a historic district.

Skyscape, at 10th St. and Portland Av., kitty-corner from Grant Park, will feature a 26-story rectilinear glass and stone tower rising from a brick base. Chicago architect Bob Bistry said the approval process went smoothly because the Elliott Park Neighborhood Association knew what they wanted.

"They realized that density and mixed-use were good," he said. The neighborhood and city did suggest adding more precast so it wasn't all glass, he added.

South of Grant Park, the Elliot Park neighborhood and the city approved a 21-story tower of glass, steel and metal or precast by architects Horty Elving.

"Some people felt it should not be contemporary," said architect Tom Horty. "We thought there was a market for it." The architects, who are also the developers, are pursuing financing.

And in history-rich northeast Minneapolis, five neighborhoods have applauded a development that features two all-glass midrise buildings on the site of the Eastgate Shopping Center. The blue glass cubes are designed by the Toronto firm Architects Alliance, which also has designed the all-glass Reflections towers in Bloomington near the Mall of America, hands-down the most forward-looking of current designs in the metro area.

"I think it's going to be a real signature development that will bring this neighborhood into the 21st century," said P. Victor Grambsch, chair of the neighborhood task force.

In the heart of downtown, the tallest and most modern of tower designs is winning rave reviews. Janis LaDouceur's soaring glass and stone tower proposed for 10th St. and Nicollet Mall has been well-received, said the City Council's Goodman, who represents that part of downtown.

It's an encouraging sign for those who worry that Minneapolis is stuck in throwback-land.

"We're coming into a new era in Minneapolis, and I hope we're not hostages to the past," said Chuck Leer, who developed the 801 Washington and 700 N.Washington Lofts. "Respect for the past means to understand it and not destroy it and at the same time express our own voice."

Tom Meyer echoes those thoughts.

"People are drawn to tradition. The Hill House is in their imagination. Then you have the real world of how things get built now, with vinyl-clad windows and stucco over Styrofoam. So there's this fundamental gap between building practices and materials and the fantasies that people have about where they want to live."

James Dayton put it succinctly: "It's very important that we are honest to our time."