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Downtown Austin LEED Buildings

Jude Galligan | January 20, 2010 |

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59tABEZTazo]

Established by the U.S. Green Building Council and verified by the Green Building Certification Institute, LEED is the nation’s preeminent program for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings. LEED is shorthand for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design.

Legacy On The Lake is a downtown Austin apartment building designed by EDI Architecture that has been awarded LEED® Certification. They are the first residential multi-family building to do so.

How did they do it? 30% reduction of water use, 10% recycled material use, 43% of building materials sourced locally, 77% of construction waste recycled, use of low VOC interior finish materials, and 90% of interior spaces having access to daylight and views.

Several other items contributed to their LEED rating including: electric vehicle charging stations, bicycle storage and changing rooms, and water efficient landscaping. According to EDI, “Legacy on the Lake achieved LEED Certification despite having a tight construction budget. Total upcharge to achieve certification was about 1 percent of the total construction hard costs.”

The LEED 2009 rating system is based on 100 possible base points plus an additional 6 points for Innovation in Design and 4 points for Regional Priority. There are four categories of rating:

* Certified – 40-49 points
* Silver – 50-59 points
* Gold – 60-79 points
* Platinum – 80 points and above

Other downtown buildings that have achieved a LEED rating:
1) Whole Foods (LEED Certified)
2) Austin City Hall (LEED Gold)

Of note, Gables Park Plaza is a candidate for LEED certification, the Austin W Hotel and Residences (aka. Block 21 Residences) is expected to be LEED Silver ~~Austin’s first LEED Platinum building~~. Also, the under-construction Federal Courthouse is being built to achieve a LEED Silver rating.

Downtown Austin Facts

Jude Galligan | October 28, 2009 |

Do you believe downtown Austin is overbuilt? If you do, I don’t blame you for thinking that. Over the past two years, the traditional local media outlets have delivered an array of sensational headlines, like “Condos Caught By Crisis At Last“. But, dig a little deeper and you could find a new perspective based on data, rather than some columnist leading a band wagon.

At the Downtown Austin Blog, we are passionate about downtown and urban Austin real estate, but we can recognize that prices have softened. In fact, we think that’s a good thing – more people can afford to move here! As much as I’ve railed against certain Statesman columnists for their curmudgeon style sensationalism, ironically, perhaps it was those stories that drove this summer’s buying spree. If you advertise a sale, then you expect buyers to come. That’s what happened.

We’ve written about the auctions and discounts. We’ve observed how an average 25% – 30% discount will clear out a building quickly – like 90 minutes quick. We’ve seen this at Brazos Place, at 360, and at the Shore where residences which had been trading at upwards of $400 per foot in 2007 are for all intents and purposes gone.

NOW WHAT?

Recently, you might have heard former Austin Mayor Will Wynn’s radio ad for downtown living. I’ve only heard this ad on KGSR, but it could be playing elsewhere. Click below to listen to it.

This advertisement directs you to a website called downtownaustinfacts.com. The goal of this website is to combat mis-information about downtown Austin being over built. To quote the website…

While many people believe that the Downtown Austin condo market is overbuilt, the fact is only about 400 new condos remain for sale downtown. With the economic downturn and continuing tight credit markets it is very unlikely that any more new condos will be built downtown for at least another 5 years. That means there are only 400 new downtown condos for sale for the next 5 years.

By my count this number is low. If you only count Spring, W Hotel, Four Seasons, and the Austonian, then 400 units is close to accurate. If you include the remaining units at the Sabine and 904west, (those are rehabs, not new construction) then the number is closer to 475. Those extra 75 don’t make a big dent in the argument, however.

THE INVENTORY IS LOCKED IN. You will not see any new projects come out of the ground until at least 2013, perhaps longer.

Here are more facts that DAB has come up with.

1) # of downtown Austin condos available for sale and ready for immediate occupancy = 284, approximately (156 in MLS + 128 Spring units, not including 44 units at Sabine)
2) # of downtown Austin condos under $300 per foot = 42 (from MLS, not including the 44 units at Sabine)

By and large, the new product under construction in downtown Austin is considered luxury product. Downtownaustinfacts.com makes this point salient, even if not overtly. Sabine will go to auction, soon, and then what is left that’s under $300 per foot? The answer: only resales. Over the next few years expect this shortage to drive demand for resales.

The past few years have been dominated by new construction. That’s over. The remaining inventory of new construction in downtown Austin happens to also be the most expensive. We can speculate on pricing discounts, but until those buildings are complete, and we see contracts converting to closings, it’s too early to tell what the velocity of sales will be, and how aggressively they will negotiate with buyers. What the data clearly shows is a shortage of attainably priced homes in downtown Austin. There is no slowing the demand for downtown living.

-Jude

Look For Changes On West 6th

Jude Galligan | August 12, 2009 |

The Daily Texan is reporting that we can expect a major face on W 6th including a new hotel. “The hotel will be a first-class, garden-style, low-rise, contemporary boutique hotel”.

City of Austin v. Harry Whittington: the saga of a parking garage

Jude Galligan | December 4, 2008 |

17,000 square feet of empty retail space rests at the base of the Convention Center’s parking garage. This retail space has the potential to add vibrancy and day time services to the Entertainment District. This is the only retail space within a few hundred feet of the 555, the Sabine on 5th, the Hilton, the Hilton Garden Inn, and the Convention Center. So, why hasn’t this space been filled?

After the jump: Part 1 of the chronology of City of Austin v. Harry Whittington
[Read more…] about City of Austin v. Harry Whittington: the saga of a parking garage

Downtown Austin Condos: Build or bust? Fact or editorial disguised as fact?

Jude Galligan | November 28, 2008 |

by jude galligan

does the statesman use dirty headline tactics? — "At last?"

The Austin American Statesman is one of two local papers (the other being the Chronicle) that reach Austin’s masses. These newspapers set the agenda and guide the discussion on topics of their choosing. The words printed on the pages of the Statesman, Austin’s most widely read newspaper, have the power to affect the home values and lives of thousands of Austinites. With that power comes responsibility.

Wednesday morning I picked up a Statesman at Jos Coffee and in big bold black letters “Condos caught by crisis at last”, “Breakneck rate on sales of units, construction slows as credit and capital dry up”.

Curiously, neither of those dramatic headlines exist in the online version of the article. In the print edition, immediately to the left, in much smaller font, was the news – the government is injecting $800MM to expand the credit markets.

Shonda Novak is a staff writer at the Statesman and wrote the above article. Shonda has been reporting on Austin real estate for years. If Shonda writes that the sky is falling on Austin real estate, then 100k+ Austin readers look at their spouse and say “Hon, did you see that article in today’s paper about Downtown condos? I’m telling you, Babe, those developers will never sell all those condos! Just wait and they’ll be selling them at twenty cents on the dollar!”

I read and re-read the article. Seeing the print edition headline, I expected catastrophe. Instead, I found nothing at all particularly newsworthy.

Is it possible that the Statesman’s headline was overly sensational?

Taking a similar approach to how I dissected this article, after the jump, I’ve cut/pasted a handful of quotes from the article, and then I explain if that quote is, generally speaking, true, false, or if the quotes are generalizations or simply editorial in nature.