urbanMSP

Then complain that proposals are bland, and too short, and use cheap products? Because the lower rents wouldnt make a nice building profitable. Great idea.

I'd like to think that we live in a city where the prevailing culture among people able to throw away thousands monthly on rent would rather spend less on fancy digs and give more to a charity/non-profit/good cause. Anyhoo, this being a lakefront property means prices are going to be a good deal higher by default than elsewhere.

An old roommate of mine was very happy to rent vs. own. He regarded it as paying for a valuable service: He never had to worry about fixes, yard work, maintenance, HOA fees, most utilities or mortgage insurance. He could just leave, lock the door and forget about it. And he could pick up and move without worrying about selling.

I'd like to think that we live in a city where the prevailing culture among people able to throw away thousands monthly on rent would rather spend less on fancy digs and give more to a charity/non-profit/good cause. Anyhoo, this being a lakefront property means prices are going to be a good deal higher by default than elsewhere.

An old roommate of mine was very happy to rent vs. own. He regarded it as paying for a valuable service: He never had to worry about fixes, yard work, maintenance, HOA fees, most utilities or mortgage insurance. He could just leave, lock the door and forget about it. And he could pick up and move without worrying about selling.

Not to mention updates. I want to update my kitchen. That is going to cost me north of $40k. If I was renting, I could just move to a different place with a modern kitchen. Many pros and cos for both.

Also, people earn their money. It is that person's choice what they want to do with it. Lord knows they are already "giving" enough in taxes.

LMP, Nic on Fifth and the Soo Line apartments all have units which rent for more than $4,000/month. It all comes down to supply and demand. There's obviously a market for rentals at this rate. The question is, is this the right location for such a building. The natural assumption would be to put this right in the heart of downtown, but the rental rates and property value around Uptown and Lake Calhoun are just as high as they are in the core business district.

If I could live anywhere in the metro and money were no objective, I'd live here or VERY close to here. And $4,000/month units aren't for the entire buildings in those examples, but the very top penthouses and corner units in most examples. Also, $4,000/month is roughly equivalent to a mortgage of $650,000 (assuming a 30 year jumbo mortgage at 5% APR). That is fairly close to the median housing values of Sunfish Lake, Edina, Minnetonka, Orono and Wayzata. I'm not saying that's cheap or easy money (it's certainly nowhere near what we could afford), but there has to be tens of thousands of homeowners with that kind of money in the Twin Cities -- especially in the Twin Cities, a very wealthy market.

Moar renders:

http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/www/gro ... 126270.pdf

A very high quality project that will fill this vacant parcel beautifully. Creates a nice step down from Calhoun Beach Club. The architects ESG did a great job with this project.

The top-fold article caught my eye at Isles Bun & Coffee this morning:

http://www.hillandlakepress.com/PDF/15Jan.pdf

Anyone know anything about this project? Is the supposed park really a park? It's not marked as such on Google Maps. At first glance it looks like a proactive step to prevent development to me but I really know nothing about this proposal.

All the land east of the greystar lot is parkland, albeit weedy and neglected. Frankly, I love to see a street/ pass thru under the greenway just west of the dog park. A nice stop for peds and a slowdown for the cars barreling along at 43mph. That entire side of the street us underutilized Parkland.

Does anyone know why they are drilling wells on this site over that past week? I think they have two in and the drill rig set up to do another. I don't remember pollution being an issue here.

Maybe they're verifying depth of the water table.

Looked like it when I drove past today. That's going to be very cool to see come up near the lake.

And I don't mind their scale at all -- 8-10 floors.....seems apt for this area. My only wish would be if this north end of the lake could stretch either East towards Uptown or West towards West-Calhoun, or both. I'm especially interested in what they do with the strip mall where a future (and ONLY lake-accessible) LRT station will be built.

Backhoes and dumps lined up today.

Oh hell yeah! Did they come to a final design? Last I remember hearing it was still up in the air.

So now that this is coming along, we can expect the Park Board to get going on that land bridge project we were all so excited about a few years ago, right?

So now that this is coming along, we can expect the Park Board to get going on that land bridge project we were all so excited about a few years ago, right?

LOL, $110M behind on maintenance, yes building a multi-million land bridge would be something that I would expect the MPRB to do.

Have you seen their project page?

I still not sure what's going on, but they're digging and driving round piles and sheet piles. Still related to last year's sewer work?

http://www.landergroup.com/cur_2626.html

The location of the drilling, on the corner, makes it look as though it could be part of a storm sewer project.