On March 4, 2014 KOMO TV News reporter Lindsay Cohen covered the explosion of residential construction taking place in northern Belltown and surrounding Seattle Center. She interviewed Dean Jones, Owner of Realogics Sotheby’s International Realty to draw on his experience having lived and worked in the area over the past 20 years.
“I think we’re seeing this neighborhood being targeted by developers because the CBD has become so expensive to develop and arriving later in this current development cycle suggests building within smaller building envelopes,” said Jones. “The zoning in this neighborhood surrounding Seattle Center is much lower so we’re talking about more boutique communities where the developer can get into the city, get vertical quickly and be out to market in some cases before other high-rise projects are completed, even if they are under construction today.”
The Downtown Seattle Association reports that nearly 60,000 residents now live in downtown community. Between 2008 and 2012, developers added 5,056 apartment units and 1,496 condominium units Downtown. In 2013, Downtown saw an additional 2,446 apartment units come online. As of December 31, 2013, 4,442 apartment units and 707 condominium units were under construction. Including vacant units and those recently completed or undergoing renovations, Downtown Seattle now has a total inventory of more than 13,000 condominium units and 32,000 apartment units. An estimated 50 residential projects are permitted for development with a total of nearly 8,000 additional units however only 10% of this new inventory appears to be for sale.
Much of the demand stems from rapid job growth. Seattle unemployment is down from 5.3% to 5.2% with 39,200 new jobs added in the past year or an increase of 2.7%. Seattle now has 25,700 more jobs than before the recession with most being in downtown Seattle led by technology fields such as those being offered at Amazon.com.
“Many of these {corporate web} sites are reporting openings of thousands of job positions,” said Jones, with a city skyline – and cranes – behind him during the interview. “Certainly there’s a Silicon Valley, but prevailing home prices are higher (there). Cost of living – much, much higher, and of course, with that state income tax in California, you can’t help but look north to our ‘Silicon Forest’ here.”