Now that is cool! A green development powered entirely by wind!

By D.L. BENNETT
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 05/02/07

Fulton County commissioners stand poised today to approve a massive development that would transform a rural corner of deep south Fulton into its own mini-city, to be called Friendship Village.

The scope of the project — at 2,000 acres, 6,000 homes, 1 million square feet of commercial development and 12,000-plus residents — is staggering for an area that now has about 3,000 people scattered over roughly 40,000 acres.

Possibly more amazing is the lack of major opposition to such a huge, groundbreaking project.

County leaders and residents in the rural Chattahoochee Hill Country community have largely embraced the project, a rarity in metro Atlanta, where neighbors have been known to fight just about any rezoning.

“I don’t see why we wouldn’t approve it,” said Commissioner Bill Edwards, who represents south Fulton on the County Commission. “It’s kinda hard to say no to it. They’ve done their homework. They’ve done an absolutely wonderful job. I’ve heard nothing but good things about it.”

The project has already been signed off on by the Atlanta Regional Commission.

Brian Davison, managing partner with Minerva Properties, said his company has put years into helping Hill Country shape its vision and building support for this project. “The community started out by saying what they want, and now we are delivering it,” Davison said.

The property is now part of unincorporated south Fulton, but sits on the border between two proposed cities, Chattahoochee Hill Country and South Fulton. If approved today, the development could fall mostly in the city of South Fulton. The referendum on whether to create the two cities is June 18.

Friendship Village begins where South Fulton Parkway intersects Rivertown Road, then sprawls north and west. The intersection calls for a large-scale shopping center with two big-box retail anchors, townhouses, apartments, offices and smaller retailers. The plan includes a school, a YMCA and a performing arts center.

Beyond that, it basically becomes a huge conservation subdivision with small lots winding through vast amounts of preserved green space.

Of the 2,000 acres involved, Minerva is promising to leave about 1,275 acres undeveloped.

Chuck Miller, who lives nearby, said he’s impressed by land being saved. Still, he’s concerned about how Minerva will turn its collections of maps and charts and promises into buildings.

“This is a long-term project,” Miller said. “We’ll just have to wait and see. You are talking about three to five years before they even get started.”

Gene Griffith, who owns a nursery in Hill Country, also said he’s cautiously optimistic.

“The overall concept strikes me as good, but there are some things I’m concerned about,” Griffith said. He’s mostly worried about how the huge project will fit in with the overall development plan for Hill Country.

Minerva’s proposal is the latest for an Atlanta area where huge projects that transform entire communities have become routine.

The proposed Wolf Creek project in nearby Carroll County covers nearly 12,000 acres.

Cherokee has the 4,000-acre Towne Lake community and the nearby 2,000 acre BridgeMill development. There’s Tributary in Douglas and Seven Hills in Paulding. Atlanta has Atlantic Station.

Minerva has two of its own: Heron Bay in Henry County and Sun City Peachtree in Spalding County, each more than 1,500 acres.

In south Fulton, Hill Country residents and the County Commission adopted a master plan, after months of work, calling for three major development nodes of about 600 acres surrounded by vast amounts of green space. Developers would be required to buy development rights from other landowners to get density for the villages and to block other properties from ever being built on.

As proposed, Minerva’s property covers more than three times the land mass of those villages and would allow for big-box retailers when the original rule set the largest building at about 30,000 square feet. The company has also asked for nearly two dozen breaks from Hill Country rules. County planning officials are recommending that commissioners grant most of the exceptions.

Also, Davison says his company will need to buy the rights for 3,700 housing units to get his project developed, even with all of the land he’s preserved. He hopes the first house will go up sometime in 2009.

Eventually, if it all works, the project will offer homes in a variety of price ranges, apartments and condos, and places to work, shop and play, all surrounded by trees and rolling hills.

“The growth is going to come,” said Sandra Hardy, who represents south Fulton on the county zoning board. “We might as well encourage good development. This is so environmentally conducive for this area. They are offering all the amenities we need.”

Posted 2/12/2007 10:09 PM ET
By Noelle Knox, USA TODAY
Atlanta has a saturated 11.2-month supply of homes and condos for sale, up from a 7.2-month inventory in December last year. That’s the main reason prices are flat and homes are taking longer to sell, says Mike Wright of the Atlanta Board of Realtors.

Many homes are being sold by lenders who took over the properties because the owners couldn’t or didn’t pay their mortgages. “A lot of Atlanta’s resale inventory is coming from foreclosures,” Wright says. (The median-price home pictured this week, chosen at random, is one of them.)

“Atlanta, unfortunately, had been for a good number of years the No. 1 mortgage fraud market in the U.S.,” Wright says. Though lenders and regulators are now “getting a handle on it, we are suffering through foreclosures related to that.”

Atlanta was No. 3 on the list of mortgage fraud hot spots in 2005, the last year for which figures are available, according to the Mortgage Asset Research Institute.

For condos, whose average sale price exceeded $200,000 in December for the first time, there are worries that overbuilding could turn the market oatmeal-soft.

“There’s certainly concern too much new condo product is coming on board,” Wright says. “The good news is a lot of the projects, probably a dozen, announced in 2006 are now on hold.”

At one point last year, developers collectively had plans for 100 condo units priced at more than $3 million.

By WALTER WOODS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 11/02/06

A once sleepy corner of Midtown is becoming the area’s new development hot spot — in part because of its proximity to Atlantic Station.

Seventeenth Street used to be a small-scale Ansley Park thoroughfare that people used to parallel park near the High Museum of Art and a nearby Starbucks.

But that changed suddenly with the coming of Atlantic Station, metro Atlanta’s leading mixed-use project, and the big yellow bridge the DOT built to link that project to Midtown’s office district.

The bridge, which opened in 2004, created an instant gateway into Midtown from the I-75/85 connector as well as another high-profile corner on Peachtree — one with quick access to MARTA and a nice walk from amenities like the Woodruff Arts Center.

Investors have noticed, and big ones. Three real estate companies with national interests have in the past year come to own significant parcels on or near Peachtree’s intersection with 17th.

The 17th and Peachtree corner now rivals 14th and Peachtree as Midtown’s prime junction, and recent investments prove that, said Matt Bronfman, managing director at Jamestown Properties, which invested in the corner last week.

“Three companies who’ve made most of their money in a market like New York are suddenly buying into the Atlanta Midtown story,” he said. All of them near one corner.

u27A4 MetLife, the insurance giant known for its blimp, in January paid $36 million for the 5.2-acre Midtown Heights office park on 17th and Spring streets overlooking the connector.

u27A4 Tishman Speyer, a major New York real estate player and owner of Rockefeller Center, has also picked up a site at 17th and Peachtree streets near the One Midtown Plaza office building. Tishman Speyer bought the site, along with Colony Square and other assets, as part of a major push into metro Atlanta last month.

u27A4 And last week, Jamestown, a syndicate that puts German money into American real estate, paid $17.5 million for a 1.7-acre corner at Peachtree and 17th.

Jamestown and its partner, investment firm Shailendra Group, plan one or two high-rise towers with offices, hotel rooms, retail and condos.

Seventeenth is the next logical point for developers to put their money, said Kurt Hartman, vice president at Texas-based developer Hines, which built the 1180 Peachtree skyscraper at Peachtree and 14th streets.

The area “has a strong arts presence, a strong residential presence — it’s a smart move,” he said.

But it wouldn’t have happened without what’s happening on the other side of the bridge, Hartman said. “Atlantic Station and the bridge gave that section of the market credibility and viability,” he said.

Atlantic Station’s developer, New York insurance giant AIG, has also designated 17th as its main drag for office projects. Each of its office towers has been branded with a 17th Street address, and the projects so far have been winners.

The first 22-story tower, 171 17th Street, opened in 2004 and is now the local headquarters for Wachovia Corp. The 500,000-square-foot building is 95 percent leased. The property sold last year to JPMorgan for a premium — about $170 million, or $337 per square foot.

A second building, the 18-story, 350,000-square-foot 201 17th Street, will open in July, anchored by the Atlanta office of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough, South Carolina’s largest law firm. A third 500,000-square-foot building, to be called 271 17th Street, is in the planning stages.

The momentum from all of those projects is spilling across the connector into Midtown, said John Whitaker, Atlantic Station’s chief executive.

Eventually, Whitaker sees several towers of various styles and uses rising on both sides of the street — much like 14th Street looks today. “We’ll continue to accentuate the importance of the 17th Street corridor,” he said.

But the quick rise of 17th, and the rest of Midtown, has some concerned.

Tim Holdroyd, a longtime Midtown real estate broker, agreed that 17th is Midtown’s latest focal point. He bought an acre at 17th and Spring streets nine years ago.

But he worries that developers and investors are paying too much for Midtown real estate in an uncertain office and condo market.

Office leasing around the city — though improved — is tepid compared to demand for suites in the 1990s. And local condo demand, which has exploded in recent years, has cooled in the past two months, Holdroyd said.

The cost of land is getting so high it’s making it harder for developers to make a decent profit off their projects, Holdroyd said.

The same thing happened in the district in previous decades, and some properties grew weeds because developers paid too much and couldn’t get their projects out of the ground, he said.

“You have individual developers picking up huge pieces of land for huge numbers — you saw this in the 1980s and 1990s. I don’t get it,” he said.

Miller Gallman, long-time developers in the Castleberry Hill neighborhood, have announced a new mixed-use condominium development, Castleberry Point. The four-story building blends contemporary design with nostalgic flatiron, maintaining the historical and architectural integrity of the neighborhood while infusing 35,000 square-feet of street-level retail and restaurant space.

Construction is scheduled to begin this fall, and homes will be available by early 2008. The development is a testament to the evolution of Castleberry Hill, a true loft community in Atlanta. A preview of the new development will be on display at Wertz Contemporary at 264 Peters Street during the Castleberry Hill Loft Tour on October 7-8.

The Castleberry Point Sales Center will provide day-long activities during the Castleberry Loft Tour, including the opportunity to meet the judges of the tour, lectures on the past, present and future of Castleberry Hill, and cooking demos by OWC, a restaurant set to open in Castleberry Hill later this year.

“We’ve come full circle in Castleberry Hill with this project,” said Bruce Gallman of Miller Gallman. “Castleberry Point is verification that Castleberry has evolved since we stared developing here in the 1980s, to become a thriving cultural district and a gateway to downtown Atlanta and Castleberry Hill.” Blending compatible neighborhood design while aiming to unify the area with Downtown Atlanta, Castleberry Point strives to be a gateway between Castleberry Hill and Centennial Olympic Park Drive.

Castleberry Point will occupy a diamond-shaped block surrounded by Nelson, Centennial and Chapel Streets, strategically placed for views of the downtown skyline. Castleberry Point contains 108 one-, two- and three-bedroom homes, ranging from 748 to more than 2,500 square-feet, with various floor plans available, including five live/work spaces. Prices range from the $160s to the $700s.

Castleberry Point lofts include granite counter tops, stainless steel appliances, kitchen islands, master bath with separate tub and enclosed shower, ceramic tile floors, spacious balconies, rooftop decks with downtown skyline views and pre-wiring for alarm systems. Amenities at Castleberry Point include a residential rooftop pool with views of Downtown, clubhouse and fitness center with street-level retail, an open-air courtyard surrounded by restaurants, galleries and shops and an access-controlled parking deck. Additionally, a signature water element will grace the courtyard, in keeping with the Miller Gallman tradition that started with the development of Swift & Company Lofts and continues with Castleberry Point.

Castleberry Hill Historic District was once a bustling industrial center. Today it is one of Atlanta’s hottest art districts, with restaurants, coffee houses and an expanding list of art galleries. The city’s first and largest loft community, the area now claims over 900 residents, occupying more than 500 lofts. Less than a mile from CNN Center and Philips Arena, Castleberry Hill is experiencing tremendous growth, not only in residential development, but in commercial and pedestrian life as well.

Bruce Gallman joined forces with Jerry Miller in 1995 to form Miller Gallman, LLC. Mr. Miller’s development experiences include the Healey Building downtown and consulting for affordable housing, including the Summerhill neighborhood. Miller Gallman developed nearly the entire city block of Glen Iris next to City Hall East, including the Glen Iris Lofts, Troy-Peerless Lofts and Ponce Springs lofts. The company also developed A&P lofts, Whitehall Mill in Athens, Flowers Building in Columbus, Lofts on the Square in Covington, as well as Swift & Company, West Lumber Lofts, 330 Peters Street, Castleberry Row, and Fair & Walker Lofts – all in Castleberry Hill. The company continues to embark on historic rehabilitations and revitalizing emerging areas.

Interested homebuyers can register on the priority buyer’s list at www.castleberrypoint.com.

615 Peachtree Street building to be razed

By WALTER WOODS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 02/08/06

Cobb County developer Cousins Properties plans to knock down a retro office building near the Fox Theatre for its latest large-scale, mixed-use project inside Atlanta’s city limits.

Cousins will take a wrecking ball to the 12-story 1959 building, known as 615 Peachtree Street, this spring. In its place, Cousins plans to build two condo skyscrapers and a 30,000-square-foot retail center, said Larry Gellerstedt, Cousins’ president of office and residential development.

The redone 615 Peachtree development will be Cousins’ second large intown, mixed-use project in the last two years.

The company, which made a name for itself building skyline towers and wooded suburban office parks, is slowly moving toward condo, retail and office clusters located at key city intersections.

Terminus, its $170 million office and retail complex, is already under construction at Peachtree and Piedmont roads in Buckhead. The project’s first 27-story office tower, Terminus 100, is 41 percent leased and is scheduled to open in 2007.

The company also is considering residential high-rises at Terminus and is struggling with a decision to start a second office building at the site, Tom Bell, Cousins’ chief executive, told Wall Street analysts during a Tuesday call to discuss the company’s 2005 financial results.

Cousins’ move into mixed-use projects is largely market-driven. Retail sales at its open-air malls have been healthy and condos at its early projects are selling briskly, while leasing demand for its office buildings is improving but cool, executives said.

Occupancy at Cousins office buildings across the country is 88 percent, up from 85 percent a year ago.

Cousins moved into the condo business in 2004 with a 529-unit tower in downtown Miami. But the company isn’t just doing mega-developments as it wades into the housing market: a 117-unit condo development near Piedmont Park bears the mark of Gellerstedt, whom Cousins brought on board after acquiring his Atlanta-based condo development company last year.

That development, like Cousins’ Miami project, is nearly sold out. Units at both buildings start at about $200,000 and go up to $1 million.

At 615 Peachtree, Cousins plans a 30-story residential high-rise along Ponce de Leon Avenue, Gellerstedt said. A second tower, fronting Peachtree Street, will likely be a mix of homes and offices, depending on the office market, he said.

The 615 Peachtree building and its Space Age parking deck wrap around the historic 1913 Ponce de Leon Apartments condo building and front both Peachtree Street and Ponce de Leon Avenue. Wachovia Bank still is using the 615 Peachtree site, but the company will move out in the next few months.

Cousins’ new project will be across Peachtree from its signature project, the 50-story Bank of America Plaza, which Cousins built at Peachtree Street and North Avenue in 1992.

By BRENDEN SAGER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 07/25/05

Marietta officials are moving aggressively to spawn city-financed private redevelopment projects near the historic Marietta Square.

But two recent votes show the city’s leadership is divided on how fast to move ahead. Earlier this month, Mayor Bill Dunaway cast a rare tiebreaking vote to give local developer Wes Godwin $400,000 to fund unanticipated costs in a condominium development.

That vote, along with a 4-2 vote to provide developer Marty Littleton $660,000 for his duplex redevelopment, exposed fissures on the Marietta council over criteria for giving tax dollars to real estate investors. The investors say that without the public money, their projects would not move forward and the city would lose economic development, new homeowners and new jobs.

In the coming months, Marietta is expected to approve several site plans for projects that will drastically change the downtown.

The City Council will choose contractors to build multimillion-dollar projects. It also could give large sums of tax dollars to developers to get these projects moving, or to fund high-quality development. But the scope and speed of the city’s activity have made some residents and county officials uncomfortable.

Godwin received money from the city for several construction expenses, including demolition and debris removal of a longtime abandoned taxicab garage. In its place he’s building the 32-unit Marietta Mill Lofts condominium. The $10.4 million, four-story structure will be on a bluff with views of downtown Atlanta.

Littleton received money to rebuild 17 run-down World War II-era duplexes as single-family homes with a total market value of about $9.6 million. Littleton will use the funds to move utilities, build sidewalks and locate driveways behind the structures. Both projects are close to the Marietta Square.

The money for Godwin’s and Littleton’s projects comes from a tax allocation district. The districts work by financing bonds with future tax contributions from redevelopment. Tax values are frozen at current levels, and the bonds are repaid with property taxes generated by increased values that come with redevelopment.

Traditionally, tax district subsidies are agreed upon before construction. However, both Godwin’s and Littleton’s projects broke ground months ago.

Councilman Pete Waldrep voted against giving them tax funds, saying that providing tax dollars after construction commences could result in similar requests from future developers.

“You’re telling people, ‘Plan your project, but — oops — if you make a mistake you have the ability to come back to us,’ ” Waldrep said.

Councilman Philip Goldstein supported the measures because the projects were among the earliest redevelopments in the city, and therefore faced higher risks of failure.

“The first projects out of the box are generally the most difficult,” he said. “I’ll look at each of these on a case-by-case basis.”

Cobb County Commission Chairman Sam Olens said he was concerned Marietta could “set a dangerous precedent” by giving out redevelopment dollars after projects commence. Olens’ opinion didn’t count in the recent City Council votes, but the County Commission will have a say over adoption of future tax districts. Within a tax district, all the local boards that levy property taxes must vote to pledge their portion of taxes toward the district.

In Marietta, about 10 percent of most residents’ property taxes go to the city, 60 percent to the Marietta school board and 30 percent to Cobb County. That means if the county and school board don’t support the district, the city loses 90 percent of the district’s potential to fund redevelopment.

Some Marietta residents fear the city is moving too fast.

Sam Elliott said city officials promised that affordable housing would be included in city-backed redevelopment projects. He said in more recent proposals, affordable components seem absent, with the lowest home prices about $160,000. Elliott defined affordable housing as homes costing no more than $140,000.

“By that standard, affordable housing is now off the table,” Elliott said. “I think that our city leaders should have the integrity to say that’s not going to be the priority in these projects.”

Elliott said the city’s redevelopment objectives — beyond economic return — aren’t clear to the public.

“I don’t think there’s a guiding principle behind [redevelopment], but there should be,” he said. “You don’t get halfway across the ocean and determine which course you’re going to take. You have to have a clear heading in front of you.”

Voters in three other Cobb cities — Acworth, Powder Springs and Smyrna — also approved tax districts, but those cities’ councils have taken a go-slower approach.

Acworth’s Super Target shopping center is under way, and Mayor Tommy Allegood said recently that developers have requested tax district funds for other projects and the city has refused them. Powder Springs is reviewing developer proposals for its single downtown mixed-use retail and residential project. Smyrna has yet to announce a tax district project.

In contrast, Marietta has five projects in different stages. In June, developers proposed two more, and the city is studying ways to extend the borders of the current tax district to accommodate them.

Gary Eubanks, president of Wharton Management Inc. and a retired lawyer and manager of a row of downtown Marietta retail and office buildings, proposed one of the new sites.

Eubanks has proposed building a $10.4 million office building on the site of an old warehouse and parking lot, just a block from downtown. He billed the Atlanta Northern project as the first “Class A” office space near downtown in 25 years.

Eubanks also has requested a $600,000 tax subsidy that, he said, would make or break the project.

“If the [tax district] isn’t approved, nothing happens — it stays a parking lot,” Eubanks said.

Eubanks said the money is justified because intown developers face increased costs compared with their suburban competitors.

Eubanks said the tax money would pay to move utility and sewer connections that converge in a dense thicket at a busy intersection.

He said he’s also taking a risk on bringing high-quality office space to Marietta.

“It’s a fairly expensive proposition. The [tax district] is a way of leveling the playing field . . . with office developers in west Cobb,” he said. “There’s a market for Class A, but it’s hard to know the depth of it.”

By REBECCA McCARTHY
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 05/16/05

Norcross resident Judy Naylor remembers riding her bike as a child from her home on South Peachtree Street to downtown Norcross, two blocks away. She would pedal to school, the pharmacy or the hardware store.

At 22, she and her husband, Wayne, moved to a historic house on Cemetery Street, also only two blocks from downtown and a block from Buford Highway — then a two-lane road. They worked for Gwinnett County Public Schools, reared two sons and renovated their house.

In the next few months, the Naylors will be moving. When Judy, 50, retires from Norcross High School this year, she and Wayne will relocate to their mountain home in North Carolina.

They hope their Norcross house will be relocated, too. The current site is scheduled to undergo some big changes.

A mixed-use complex of street-level shops, lofts and live/work town homes is slated for Cemetery and College streets, including the Naylors’ lot. It’s just one of several projects that could transform downtown Norcross from quiet and quaint to bigger and bustling.

New lofts will overlook the city’s baseball field.A 20,000-square-foot cultural arts center will be built at the end of Jones Street. There’s an ambitious housing development going up on land that belonged to manufacturer Rock-Tenn. And another housing community, Lum Howell Park, is to be built on 5 acres along West Peachtree, Lake and Autry streets.

All of the projects have zoning approval. And all of them, city leaders hope, will help make Norcross a more vibrant and viable place to live.

Many of the projects — at least the concepts behind them — were a part of the city’s Town Center study. The 2001 study was funded by the Atlanta Regional Commission’s Livable Cities Initiative and reflects long- and short-term improvement goals.

These goals include providing house opportunities downtown; encouraging mixed-use development; expanding retail opportunities; increasing the city’s sense of place and community identity; expanding sidewalks and improving pedestrian safety; and planning for future transit, commuter rail and parking needs.

A “beautiful and critical piece of the puzzle” is a 20,000-square-foot cultural arts center, said Johnny Lawler, Norcross’ director of community development. Working with consultant Kevin McOmber of Clark Patterson Associates, a 15-member committee is figuring out the community’s needs and desires for the facility, which backs up to the city’s baseball field.

Two priorities are a theater and a senior citizens center. Meeting rooms, exhibit space and a baseball museum also are being considered. City Councilman Josh Bare says he hopes for a prominent display on the city’s history.

The city budgeted $3.5 million in special purpose local option sales tax funds to pay for the cultural arts center, designed to resemble the old Norcross school. An additional $400,000 will come from federal funds.

But the Town Center plan encompasses private as well as public development.

On the north side of the railroad tracks, two residential developments are taking shape, both within walking distance of downtown.

Norcross architect Robert Forro is building Lum Howell Park, the single-family home complex. It’s near one of his earlier residential projects, Col. Jones Park. Finished in 2000, that development features 22 new craftsman-style homes with front porches and rear garages. Two historic homes also were saved and incorporated into the mix.

The 24 houses in Lum Howell Park — named for a Norcross blacksmith — will present their porches to the existing streets and their back garages on a common park about the size of a football field, Forro says.

Large, mature trees, walking trails and a meadow will be in the park. The houses will sell from $380,000 to $450,000 and will range from 2,400 to 3,500 square feet.

“I think of downtown Norcross as beachfront property,” says Forro, an advocate of New Urbanism principles of in-fill development, connectivity, pedestrian accessibility and an orientation toward the street. “It increases the value of your home to be close to it. This development will offer easy access to downtown.”

On Thrasher Street, demolition of an 85,000-square-foot building once belonging to Rock-Tenn has begun, the first step in a 12-acre development walking distance from downtown.

Cumming-based Hedgewood Properties, Professional Builder magazine’s 2003 Builder of the Year, plans to construct 23 detached homes, 95 town homes and 42 condominiums in three buildings. Development partner David M. Smith said the goal is to provide a wide array of home prices, ranging from $200,000 for the condos to as much as $600,000 for the larger houses.

There will be six or seven parks and, for homeowners, a swimming pool and possibly a tennis court. The company hopes to start building in four to six months.

Smith says Hedgewood officials are excited about working in Norcross.

Hedgewood looks for ways to reduce driving for residents of its developments. With employment and shopping close by, and an intact downtown, Norcross fit that bill.

Forro is also the man behind the shops, lofts and town homes on College and Cemetery streets and the ballpark condos. He hopes to begin marketing the mixed-use and live/work projects soon.

It’s enough to make Judy Naylor wonder how her town will look in a few years.

“Things have changed a lot in Norcross over the years,” she said, “and we’re really excited about the changes coming to town.”

By CHRISTOPHER QUINN
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 04/11/05

There is high interest in high-rise living north of I-285.

The Manhattan, a 27-story condominium tower that will rise above the 44-acre Perimeter Place mixed-use community just broke ground, but more than half of the 227 units are sold, the developers say.

The prices range from $200,000 up to about $500,000 for condos of up to 1,600 square feet. Both million-dollar penthouses are already sold.

“We always felt there was a demand for a high-rise product in the Perimeter market, but we are a little surprised there is this much interest so early, without there being a building coming out of the ground,” said Satish Lathi of Southeast Capital Partners, the development company.

Move-in dates won’t be until at least summer 2006.

The Sembler Co. is developing the retail part of the community, which will include restaurants, a grocery store and shops. They should begin opening this fall.

The Manhattan is the highest of eight condo projects under development along I-285 between the Cumberland area, where I-75 intersects the highway, and the Perimeter area where Ga. 400 intersects.

Housing experts say the tens of thousands of workers who crowd the offices in the Cumberland and Perimeter areas are driving the market. More than 100,000 people work in the Perimeter area, according to estimates from the Perimeter Community Improvement District.

Dale Henson, a housing-market consultant, said, “The Perimeter is almost an urban market. It has more jobs surrounding it than Midtown. I would think [Southeast Capital Partners] would have very good success there.”

Lathi said early buyers, who are plunking down from 5 percent to 10 percent nonrefundable downpayments, are coming from across the spectrum, including singles, young couples and empty nesters. A common thread that connects many is that they work in the area, he said.

The condo tower is packing in the amenities that have been successful in the hot Midtown condo market, including a swimming pool, exercise rooms, tennis court, an indoor golf training center and rooftop deck that will take in the sweep of Buckhead and Atlanta’s downtown skyline.

Derrick Tennant, owner of D1 Sports, which runs adult athletic leagues, lives nearby in an apartment but is eager to move into the 15th-story condo he put money down on. He said the location was ideal. His office will be a block away, the condo is just off I-285, and the mixed-use community should make life easy.

“That’s just attractive. You can walk downstairs to go grocery shopping . . . MARTA, restaurants, everything is right there.”

By PAUL DONSKY
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Monday, December 13, 2004

About two miles east of downtown, Memorial Drive becomes a traffic-clogged industrial strip dotted with factories and warehouses, including the sprawling Parmalat dairy complex.

The most notable landmark is a giant TV tower. I-20 roars only a block away, cutting the area off from the leafy Grant Park neighborhood.

Not the most promising place to find high-end residential development, right?

Think again. This hardscrabble stretch has become one of the city’s most unlikely housing hot spots.

The A&P Lofts, an abandoned grocery warehouse and bakery, was renovated in 2001 and is now home to 57 apartments.

Across the street, a former used motorcycle parts warehouse is being converted into 80 luxury condos. The Ezell Lofts will feature marble bathrooms in each unit, a rooftop pool and a bar/lounge in the lobby. The development company says it is shooting for a South Beach vibe.

Next door is the Metal Works Townhomes, a 46-unit complex of brightly colored, three-story townhomes.

Loft conversions and luxury condos are nothing new to Midtown and Buckhead, Atlanta’s most cosmopolitan neighborhoods. But in recent years, the trend has spread to industrial areas like the Memorial corridor that in the past would have scared off developers.

Condos line busy DeKalb Avenue along the MARTA line and CSX rail yard east of downtown. The new M West townhouses recently opened on the site of a former lumberyard, near freight yards in heavily industrial northwest Atlanta. The Dynamic Metals Lofts, a new development near the King Historic District, sits beside a metal factory and near a string of auto shops and warehouses.

The trend is fueled by people like Allan Altman, who want to live in an intown loft without paying Midtown or Buckhead prices or squeezing into a tiny space in those neighborhoods.

Altman and his partner moved into a three-story, 1,700-square-foot home in the Metal Works last August. The townhouse, which cost about $240,000, has a two-car garage, a side yard, two bedrooms and two bathrooms.

“It would be unaffordable in Midtown,” said Altman, a real estate agent.

Meanwhile, Altman, 45, gets to enjoy life in the city. He’s a short drive from downtown and Midtown. And the area around his new home is changing fast, he notes, with a growing roster of restaurants, bars and cafes.

“It’s hot — that whole Memorial corridor is coming up,” he said. “From my point of view, [the Metal Works] is the best investment I could make intown right now, because prices are so high” elsewhere.

The average home in the area around the Metal Works costs $81,700, according to the 2000 U.S. census. That compares with $230,000 in Midtown and $387,400 in Buckhead.

Christopher Rampton moved into the A&P Lofts in May. Rampton, 22, doesn’t mind being in an industrial area. He’s close to his downtown office and near bars and clubs in the trendy East Atlanta neighborhood.

“Location was huge for me, because I ride my bike to work, and I don’t want to deal with a commute at all,” he said.

Rampton and his roommate share a 1,900-square-foot, two-bedroom loft that includes soaring ceilings, huge windows and a large back deck that looks out onto the busy Glenwood-Memorial Connector. The deck has a large container garden, several benches and a bowling alley.

“I guess in a Utopian universe, there wouldn’t be that much traffic around me,” he said. “But I like living in the city. I don’t mind [the noise].”

Atlanta developer George Rohrig also is betting on the area. Rohrig, who has built restaurants in Buckhead and Midtown and now is branching out with strip centers in Grant Park and Kirkwood, owns a former train depot on Memorial that he hopes to lease as a restaurant.

The charming, all-brick Atlanta & West Point Railroad station is at the intersection of Memorial and the Glenwood-Memorial Connector, between the Ezell Lofts and Metal Works Townhomes and across the street from a small assembly plant. It’s also along an abandoned rail line that makes up part of the proposed Belt Line transit project.

“We love the intersection,” Rohrig said. “There’s tremendous growth there.”

He cited the area’s booming housing market, including Glenwood Park, a large mixed-use community being built just across I-20 along the connector. The development includes condos and townhomes priced from $125,000 to more than $300,000.

And Rohrig is not concerned that the rail depot is in an industrial setting. That’s simply the new reality as intown Atlanta continues to develop, he said.

“There’s not too many pieces of land inside the Perimeter where you can build retail and have enough traffic to support it,” Rohrig said. “Those sites are becoming extinct.”

Houston businessman Larry Davis, developer of the Metal Works Townhomes, said he steered clear of Midtown and Buckhead when he scouted sites for his project because land there was simply too expensive. Instead, he sought more affordable lots in close-in neighborhoods.

Davis has stuck to this formula as he’s developed projects in Houston, Dallas, Phoenix and Las Vegas. This way, he said, he can offer more home for the price.

The market for intown living continues to grow, Davis said, as people have gotten fed up with the suburban commute.

“The traffic wasn’t as bad a decade ago,” he said. “In every large city in the U.S., people are moving back intown because of the traffic.”

And Davis is expanding his Atlanta presence. He recently bought two lots on which he plans to develop townhomes — one near the King Plow Arts Center in northwest Atlanta and another on Maynard Terrace and I-20 in east Atlanta.

Mecca Wilder and her husband, Warren, moved to the A&P Lofts in 2003 after living in Buckhead. They love the urban setting and sweeping view from their third-floor apartment.

“We’re city people,” said Wilder, 30. “For us, it’s nice to see a skyline.”