Reported by: 9News
Web produced by: Neil Relyea

One of Cincinnati’s oldest neighborhoods is going to get new upscale housing next year.

The NAI/Bergman Group will tear down an old apartment building and single-family home at the end of Allendale Drive to make way for the new 20-unit lofts project.

The building will have four floors that will include a parking garage, 10-foot ceilings and large loft-style rooms with a view of the Hyde Park Country Club golf course.

“It’s just a project [following the lines] of similar projects in Chicago, Atlanta, Columbus and Seattle,” said Brent Van Lieu, of NAI/Bergman. “We’ve taken the best of those projects and brought them here to Cincinnati.”

The condominium building will be called “The Lofts At 4120.”

Units will cost between $740,000 and $940,000.

Construction should begin by next week, with units ready by the fall of 2007.

By MARY-BETH McLAUGHLIN
BLADE BUSINESS WRITER

SANDUSKY – Dan Delahunt admits he’s not a professional developer, so it was more of a gut feeling that led him to buy and renovate a downtown building into nine condominiums and three retail spaces.

“With all the water parks going in around here, this is going to go from being a seasonal destination to a year-round one,” said the owner of HMS Home Warranty in this Erie County city. “I think Sandusky is an undiscovered gem.”

Evidence is mounting that this community along the shores of Lake Erie, 55 miles east of Toledo, won’t remain undiscovered much longer.

After years of being content to be the home of the Cedar Point Amusement Park and factories catering to the paper and cardboard manufacturing industries, Sandusky leaders have started to capitalize on the city’s setting on the lake to attract entertainment and residential projects.

“We’re hopeful that the housing that’s being put in the downtown area is going to spur on other kinds of development,” said Kelly Kresser, a spokesman for the city of Sandusky.

The Bayfront Corridor Committee, which advises the city commission on waterfront development, heard proposals in late 2002 to develop a stretch along the waterfront that had once housed a number of factories.

Out of those meetings came the deal with Mid-States Development Corp. to renovate the former home of the Chesapeake Display & Packaging Co. into nearly 200 upper-end condominiums.

In addition to the Chesapeake project and Mr. Delahunt’s Hubbard Building project, advertising firm owner Jeff Krabill is in the process of getting signed contracts for units in his LakeView Condominiums. He is putting the finishing touches on 11 units in a three-story building just a couple of blocks from the other projects.

Developers and real estate agents estimate that half the new tenants will be move-up residents from the area and the other half will be second-home owners from Midwest cities such as Chicago and Columbus.

Those projects on the city’s downtown waterfront aren’t the only new residences in Sandusky and surrounding townships.

So far this year, 90 residential units have been recorded in the area, according to the Firelands Association of Realtors, double the number last year. The figures include houses and condominiums.

County Auditor Jude Hammond said the residential growth is driven, in part, by better awareness of the area as a vacation destination, especially with the opening in recent years of at least three water parks. The attractions draw visitors from Ohio as well as Michigan, Illinois, and Pennsylvania, he said.

“There are now more travelers going into Erie County and they are becoming more aware of opportunities here,” he said.

The added residences are noteworthy in part because neither Sandusky nor Erie County is growing. The latest population estimate for the city is 27,030, down 800 from the 2000 Census count, and for the county it is 79,000, down 500 from the 2000 Census.

City leaders hope the new dwellings will mean more people in the area in the summer months.

Although upscale condominium projects have been built in recent years in nearby communities such as Port Clinton, Catawaba Island, and Huron, Sandusky’s civic and business leaders are just recognizing that shuttered factories don’t have to stay closed until another plant can be lured there, said Mr. Krabill, owner of Krabill Marketing Group.

“I think it’s been something of an evolutionary process,” he said. “It’s dawning on people that our natural destiny is for residential and more destination-type use.”

S. Robert Davis, the Columbus-area developer behind the Chesapeake Lofts at the Paper District, said he was attracted to the building because it is on Sandusky Bay, not just on the lake.

“The bay is a very attractive place to be because you get more good water days [for boating] than in other areas,” said Mr. Davis, president of Mid-States Development in Dublin, Ohio.

Workers have just started to clean up the hulking building, but all 191 planned units are either sold or reserved at prices ranging from $140,000 to $280,000, Mr. Davis said.

The project offers 20 floor plans and views of the bay.

It is the first phase of a redevelopment for a 40-acre area that could cost at least $70 million, including public money.

Next are a shopping area, marina, and restaurants, on which construction is to start in about six months. After that, plans call for an outdoor amphitheater, a water park, and a hotel.

Mr. Davis also plans a condo project in a 10-story building to be erected about a mile from the Chesapeake building. It is to have 100 condos, starting at $300,000 each.

Mr. Delahunt said he did not seek government help to develop the former Hubbard Building so he decided to finish his building before trying to sell the units.

With the first floor to be used by stores, the project is to have three condo units on each floor, with each unit to be 1,200 to 1,600 square feet, he said.

Six of the nine living units have views of the bay. The units are priced $150,000 to $300,000.

“I’ve designed them for local people because they’re larger than the typical loft, but I’ve had a lot of interest both locally and from out of town,” he said.

Mr. Krabill has turned a three-story limestone building, originally built in 1860 as a hotel, into 11 condominiums, one of which will be an office. They range from 1,750 to 2,750 square feet, some with balconies, and are to sell for $355,000 to $555,000.

Indoor and outdoor water parks in the area, the number of which could spurt as high as 10, will draw even bigger vacation crowds than the nearby marinas and Lake Erie islands already do, he said.

The interest in the downtown condominium projects does not surprise Jeffrey Berquist, the broker/owner of Prudential Stadtmiller Realty in Sandusky.

“Anytime you can move 200 to 300 people with the demographics they’re looking at, it should have a very positive impact on downtown Sandusky,” he said.

Other housing also has sprung up. The developer of the upscale Hidden Harbour Lagoons development on Lake Erie near Cedar Point said all but one of the 55 planned houses there have been built, selling for $500,000 to $3 million each.

“We saw a real demand for upscale housing in our area,” said Ms. Lynch, of Hoty Enterprises Inc. in Sandusky.

As a result, the developer is building the Angel’s Path subdivision behind the Sandusky Mall in Perkins Township, which is not on Lake Erie. It is attracting move-up buyers and executive transferees, said Ms. Lynch. Homes there cost about $500,000 and half of the original 47 lots have been sold.

“The last three homes we’ve sold in there have been to buyers from out of state, which is a good sign,” she said.

Flowers Building moves away from leasing; buyers face hefty price tags

BY TONY ADAMS
Staff Writer

Dwelling on price

Reynolds Bickerstaff has heard comments that the Flowers Building loft apartments might be priced too high. After all, a 731-square-foot studio runs $89,000. The largest, an 1,826-square-footer with three bedrooms and two baths, looks to fetch a quarter of a million dollars.

“It’s really hard because there’s nothing to compare them with,” Bickerstaff, a real estate agent with Waddell Realty Co., said Wednesday. “Even if we set the prices $20,000 lower, people would be asking how we came up with those prices.”

The concept certainly is new to the Columbus residential market. While individual loft apartments have been sold downtown in recent years, this is the first time a complex of them have been put up for sale. Two other properties — Johnston Mill Lofts and 11th Street Lofts — lease their units just as the Flowers Building has done since March 2003.

Atlanta-based Miller-Gallman Developers began renovating the Flowers Building in the summer of 2002, spending $2.4 million on the project.

Bickerstaff’s marketing effort started with an open house in early February. Since then he has accepted reservations for 11 of the 18 units, although current renters have “right of first refusal” under Georgia law. Letters informing tenants of their rights and the 120-day period in which they must make a decision to purchase or not should be sent out by Friday.

Sellout expected

Transactions could begin as soon as next week, said Bickerstaff, who anticipates the residential space selling out by early September. He also is offering the building’s first floor to commercial users. Ben’s Wings & Things and Security Finance Co. occupy about 2,400 square feet of space, while 4,100 square feet remain vacant since the renovation.

“I’m trying to get someone to open up a little breakfast or lunch deli on the corner, something that would complement Twelfth Street Deli,” he said. “This area of downtown is not ready, I think, for a night restaurant. It’s definitely got a great lunch market.”

Bickerstaff said he has been “surprised” at the relatively easy sales effort it has taken with the Flowers Building, even with its unique architecture, downtown convenience and views. His target market is young working professionals and affluent older residents who live outside Columbus, but need a place to stay two or three days a week when doing business downtown.

“Columbus is a big town, but it’s got a small town feel,” Bickerstaff said. “This would be a great way to simplify your life, I think, and reduce the clutter that gives you everyday headaches and causes problems.”

Parking is the prime issue at the Flowers Building. The complex now leases 15 spaces from Trinity Episcopal Church across the street. Bickerstaff hopes to secure at least a couple of more spaces. He’s also a proponent of a special permit that would allow residents to park within a block of their apartment.

“You always get back to the parking issue,” he said. “People in Columbus don’t like to walk. It’s crazy. They want to park right in front of a door. They don’t want to walk a block and enjoy being outside.”

More loftson the market

Keenly watching the Flowers project is Tom Flournoy, president of Flournoy Development Co., which renovated the H.L. Green, Tarver and old YMCA buildings into a 46-unit complex called 11th Street Lofts. The apartments steadily achieve a 95 percent occupancy rate, he said.

The plan, Flournoy said, is to sell the apartments after the historic tax credits expire five years from the structures’ renovation. That would be in 2007.

“If they sell those well, that’s good, because they don’t have any dedicated parking” on site like 11th Street Lofts, the developer said.

Flournoy also is partnering with the W.C. Bradley Co. to transform a portion of the Eagle & Phenix Mill on Front Avenue into residential, office and commercial space. Plans include 104 rental units and between 50 and 60 condominiums, some overlooking the Chattahoochee River. Initial price estimates for the Eagle & Phenix condos range from $125,000 to $500,000 and up.

There are no plans to convert Johnston Mill Lofts from rental to sales, said Ashley Bloechle, leasing consultant for the complex that features 336 units with private parking, swimming, tennis and fitness facilities, and access to the Chattahoochee Riverwalk.

Roswell, Ga.-based developer PRS Companies used low-income tax credits to rehabilitate the old textile mill into living quarters. The tax-credit program requires a portion of the apartments be offered at below-market rates. The credits typically stretch out 10 to 15 years.

Johnston Mill Lofts has plenty of turnover and currently is 65 percent occupied, Bloechle said.

“We have a good bit of military,” she said. “We lost a bunch with that last deployment (in January). But we also have a lot of people, it seems, from Aflac and TSYS, and the hospital’s right here by us. I would say that’s our main group of customers.”

The mix of rental lofts and for-sale condos in the downtown area is healthy, Flournoy said. As Columbus State University expands into downtown, complementing the existing commercial and entertainment infrastructure, the area should only blossom, he said.

“The bigger the variety and the more people that you have there, that’s what it’s going to take,” he said. “It’s all of these people combining together that’s going to make it a fully energized community.”

Spectrum spending $11M on third project

By Brian R. Ball
Business First of Columbus

A building that once housed a shoe factory will become the latest downtown Columbus condo conversion by the developers behind the nearby Connextions and Eclextion lofts condominiums.

William Shelby and Jack Hoopes, principals of Spectrum Properties Inc., plan to transform the six-story building at 78 E. Chestnut St. into 48 condos. The residences, many of which would be priced under $265,000, could be completed by spring 2006 after a $9 million renovation.

Spectrum bought the 86,000-square-foot building Dec. 27 for $1.9 million from Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co.

Shelby likes the building’s location. Though Chestnut Street isn’t heavily traveled, he said, the building’s location near North Third Street puts it at a “gateway” to downtown.

“The nice thing is, you have tons of support services along Nationwide Boulevard,” he said. “And it’s within walking distance to Capitol Square, the Arena District and the Short North.”

The project also is less than three blocks from the developers’ first downtown condo conversion, the Connextions Lofts at 104 N. Third St., and their most recent project, the Eclextion Lofts at 221 N. Front St.

It’s also around the corner from JDS Cos.’ Sixty East Spring project, an apartment and condo complex on East Spring between Third and North High streets.

Hoopes expects the Chestnut project to complement Eclextion Lofts, which has 55 units mostly priced between $165,000 and $225,000, though some sell for more than $275,000.

“We don’t have anything at Eclextion between $225,000 and $275,000,” Hoopes said. “We’re hoping this project fills that void.”

Spectrum picked Mary Raysa and Helen Nilsson of HER Realtors, marketers of Connextions and Eclextion Lofts, to sell the Chestnut condos.
Extended history

Huntington National Bank is providing a $7.56 million loan to redevelop of the Chestnut building, which was built between 1910 and 1920.

Developer Robert J. Weiler, whose family once owned the property, said the building once was a shoe factory but has been used for offices in recent years.

Abel Corp., a tire producer, had its corporate offices in the building in the mid-1950s, when Weiler joined his father’s real estate company. At the same time, slipper producer R.G. Barry Corp., now based in Pickerington, had its headquarters and a sewing operation in the building.

The Weilers’ involvement with the property ended in the 1970s.

An affiliate of Columbus developer Taggart Marryott Reardon owned the property for much of the 1980s. Documents also show the lender to the affiliate took control of the property at a sheriff’s sale in November 1991 after bidding $3.3 million. The lender sold the property in 1994 for $2 million to an affiliate of Dublin-based Stavroff Venture Corp., which leased the property to state and federal agencies.

Nationwide bought the building in December 1999 for $5 million. Terry Mathews and Scott Pickett of CB Richard Ellis marketed the property last year for Nationwide.

Spectrum’s acquisition includes access to 65 parking spots at a neighboring Nationwide parking garage. The developer also has several parking spots in a two-story annex to the property, as well as a two-car garage planned for a 2,000-square-foot, ground-floor condo.

Shelby said the building should be more easily redeveloped than the Eclextion and Connextions properties. The Chestnut structure has a sprinkler system and better electrical system than the other properties, which should mean less interior demolition. Shelby said the plywood floors likely will need reinforced with a layer of concrete.

Beyond that, specific plans for the project remain in flux.

“We have a lot to do,” Shelby said.
© 2005 Business First of Columbus