Our first stop was the new White Line Lofts, which is a condominium project on the edge of downtown Des Moines. The developer turned a 7 story warehouse into a 9 story residential tower. The unit prices range from $130,000 all the way up to $1.3 Million for each of the 9th floor halves. Seems like a fortune, especially considering housing prices in the QC area, but they do provide quite a nice view.
Its amazing to think of people dropping 5 or 6 hundred grand, or more, for a condo downtown. The $1.3M condos are around 4000 square feet each, which still comes out to about $325 per square foot. Contrast that with the remaining Bucktown Loft condo, which is $235,000 for 2800 square feet. That comes out to a measly $84 per square foot. Considering the beautiful Mississippi river view, its practically a steal.After the White Line tour, we were able to check out an interesting project just outside of downtown that combines the condo conversion of an older apartment building with new condos being built behind it. These are built above garages, and they're calling them Carriage Houses. Here's the thread on AbsoluteDSM with lots of pictures and renderings. Hopefully some day this kind of thing can spread out of Davenport's downtown revitalization.
The third stop was the Alchemilla, which is quite an interesting little townhouse project. It has very unique architecture, and tons of square footage. I believe the unit owned by our host and forum member was around 2400 square feet. The views of downtown Des Moines from the 3rd floor were pretty great too. We were able to talk to the developers from all 3 projects, so it was interesting to hear some of the hurdles they had to overcome in each of their developments.
That was the official end of the meet, but I was able to catch an Iowa Stars AFL hockey game at Wells Fargo Arena with 3 other forum folks. While their arena is bigger than the Mark, at least the QC had a modern arena 10 years before they did. This was my first AFL game, and although I'm not exactly a hockey expert, the level of play seemed fairly similar to the Mallards. Overall it was a great trip, and some of us from outside DSM are hoping to arrange a field trip someday to show off each of our respective metros.
Here's a link to a few photos from the trip on my Flickr page. I'm hoping to get most of the pictures I've taken over the last 2 years uploaded into Flickr at some point.
11 comments:
The Quad Cities has some of the cheapest real estate prices in the entire country, especially for a community of this size. And if you think about it, Des Moines really doesn't have much that we don't (at least in terms of amenities).
Des Moines has less crime per capita!
That Bucktown Suite 400 is just raw space. It would take at least $100-200k in further work to actually make it into a home.
But $1.3MM for a condo in DSM does seem a bit steep, no matter how nice. Heck, with that much money you could actually get a halfway decent apartment in Manhattan. Only halfway, though.
The DSM one was unfinished also.
The Bucktown and Shricker are simular; they both lack working plumbing. :)
Des Moines people seem to have a more positive outlook about their city and downtown than ours, too. That helps real estate prices. Do they have a positive outlook because crime is lower? Or is crime lower because more people have a positive outlook?
$325/sqft for residential space without any plumbing? In DSM? Seriously? Wow.
I don't know if there was plumbing or not, but there were definitely open studs.
Pioneer - I doubt a positive outlook would have a huge difference in crime, maybe a minor. On the other hand, Davenport could use some prozac added to the water.
Same amenities, you bet, more jailspace in both cities and redlight cameras. I heard our strip clubs are a bit more wild.
I am mainly referring to how a "positive outlook" relates to downtown redevelopment. I would be careful not underestimate it. If people feel positive about their downtown, they are more likely to live there. This increases the demand for nice housing downtown. This leads to fewer vacant buildings, and maybe even new buildings. Crime has to find somewhere else to go.
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