by Lora Volkert @ Idaho Business Review
09/18/2006
The developers of nine planned communities hope to build nearly 48,800 homes in Ada County over the next 15 to 20 years.
That’s enough for most of the 53,000 additional households Ada County is projected to have by 2020, according to the Community Planning Association of Southwest Idaho.
It’s also more than twice the 22,686 homes built in Ada County over the last five years of the state’s building boom, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates from the Idaho Department of Commerce and Labor.
And, finally, the total doesn’t account for additional phases of the Avimor development near Eagle or a planned community at Blacks Creek, neither of which had housing estimates available.
They are, in short, expecting big things.
The total was compiled by the Idaho Business Review using public records and estimates from developers.
Some of the first homes from the batch of planned communities will enter the market in May 2007, when Avimor plans to hold its grand opening, SunCor General Manager Bob Taunton said.
The volume of planned communities could lead to a crowded market for developers of regular subdivisions or condominium projects, especially as new homebuilders continue to enter the market.
But that doesn’t mean Ada County is in for 20 years of overbuilding, said Steve Barbey, an associate broker with Group One Real Estate.
If developers pace their building evenly, the nine planned communities would add about 2,440 houses per year to the housing market. Real estate agents sold nearly 3,000 homes just in the last three months, according to the Intermountain Multiple Listing Service.
Build-out schedules for the planned communities suggest housing won’t enter the market that evenly, but developers may be forced to delay, Barbey said.
It’s not in a developer’s best interest to build more houses than the market can absorb. If they do, Barbey said, the houses will sit empty or won’t fetch a good price.
Developers may say they’ll build thousands of homes per year now, Barbey said, but that doesn’t mean they will. If the market can only absorb 500 of their homes per year, they’ll make adjustments, he said.
“What they plan on doing and what actually comes to pass are two different things.”
Some developers have ambitious plans. Dennis Baker plans to build 3,300 homes per year in a 20,000-unit planned community called Isaac’s Canyon, according to Ralph Perez, senior vice president of Isaac’s Canyon Development Co.
Other planned community developers are playing it safe. Tucker Johnson, the developer of a 1,350-unit community called The Cliffs and of the 600-unit Hazelwood South, said he plans to build conservatively in 50-lot phases rather than 100-lot chunks.
Some planned community developers expect demand for their housing products to be higher than for the rest of their market. They’re relying on what they see as a unique product.
Eighty acres of soccer, tennis, swimming and golf academies at the center of The Legacy, a 1,350-unit planned community planned in west Eagle, will be a draw in a market where so many people are active in the outdoors, said project manager Todd Santiago.
Isaac’s Canyon could be set apart from other planned communities because it plans be the first LEED-certified green planned community in the country. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design is developing green building standards for residential communities, Perez said. Isaac’s Canyon Development plans to develop its building standards to coincide with LEED’s requirements, he said.
Isaac’s Canyon also plans to offer fiber optic cable to every home and build denser, more city-like housing, Perez said. The developer plans to build four or five elementary schools, two middle schools and a high school, he said.
Perez said he expects the real estate market to be cyclical, and during downturns Isaac’s Canyon Development plans to change its product mix and offer more small homes and fewer high-end houses.
But he still banks on Isaac’s Canyon being so unusual he’ll be able to sell houses no matter what the rest of the market is doing.
“There are no planned communities in the Valley like the type of planned community we’re doing,” Perez said.
* * *
No comments:
Post a Comment