Old, Large Apartments Redeveloped New and Small
August 30th, 2016 by John Mansfield
“Brookland Manor today has 134 four- and five-bedroom apartments. Yet when the new community is built, none of its 1,646 apartments or 114 for-sale townhouses will have more than three bedrooms, and a vast majority will have only one or two.
Brookland’s owner, Mid-City Financial Corp., based in Germantown, Md., told the city’s Zoning Commission that four- and five-bedroom apartments ‘are not consistent with the creation of a vibrant new community.'”
(link)
“Four- and five-bedroom units in the District constitute just 8 percent and 4 percent of available rental housing, respectively, with most of the properties in Wards 7 and 8, the city’s poorest areas, according a report last year.”
Comments (5)
Filed under: We transcend your bourgeois categories | No Tag
Filed under: We transcend your bourgeois categories | No Tag
August 30th, 2016 12:56:43
G.
August 30, 2016
Diversity= no big families?
Oh, sorry, the buzzword bingo here is “vibrant” and “new.”
Apparently the creation of new life is incompatible with being “vibrant”, i.e., living, and new.
Bookslinger
August 30, 2016
Chicken and egg. Supply must adjust to demand. I’ve been an apartment dweller all my adult life, and I’ve never seen or heard of 4 bedroom apartments. Even 3 bedroom apts/townhouses are relatively expensive and much less common than 1 or 2 bedrooms
I think the economic reality of urban living is if you can afford a 4 bedroom apt, it’s cheaper to buy and pay a mortgage on a house.
aardvark
August 30, 2016
True, larger apartments really don’t do so well on the market. However don’t underestimate the lengths developers will go to squeeze more money out of their properties. For instance, giving everyone on the lower levels of a condo tower one inch less of clear headroom so they can squeeze in another floor under the height restrictions (no joke).
My experience with developers; vibrant = childless couples with copious amounts of disposable income. The urban idea of vibrant usually revolves around cafe’s with outdoor seating and a few bars.
Andrew
August 31, 2016
I hadn’t thought of packing kids in four per room, but I suppose it could work easy enough with two sets of bunk beds and an eve distribution of genders.
Bookslinger
August 31, 2016
My thoughts of who would rent a 4 or 5 bedroom apt outside of Utah, would be older affluent couples whose children are beyond college age. I can see a master bedroom, guest bedroom, tv room/den, and hobby/storage room. They would have to be rich enough to afford a 4 br apt, plus also rich and old enough to not be worried about building equity with that high of a rent payment.
Renting is poor investment because you’re not building equity, and condos generally don’t appreciate.
So, in that one guy’s defense, “vibrant” may mean people with one or two children, or people under age 55.