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Originally Posted by OU812
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A Dallas-based developer expects to break ground on a roughly 45-story apartment tower overlooking Lady Bird Lake by early 2019. It’s one of two apartment high-rises Genesis Real Estate Group has proposed for the Villas on Town Lake condo site near the Rainey Street Historic District.
The company submitted a site plan application to the city earlier this month and it expects to break ground on construction in about nine or 10 months.
Genesis Real Estate purchased the Villas, a 58-unit condo project at 80 Red River Street, last June after the majority of condo owners voted to sell the property.
Originally the Austin American-Statesman reported the tower would be roughly 40 stories high. This week though Genesis President Gordon Ip said it will go even higher, at 45 stories or even as many as 50 stories.
Although the footprint of the project is set, the height and design depend on the composition of the skyscraper's penthouses and whether parking is built above or underground.
“We’re still validating our unit mix with the marketplace and trying to see what would work best in the city of Austin,” Ip said. “We want to do something that’s unique but not pioneering. We want to be slightly different and we don’t want be so far out of left field.”
Ip expects it will take the rest of the year to move through site plan reviews with the city because Genesis doesn’t need to request any zoning changes to the Central Business District site.
The company has two concurrent site plan reviews with the city to first demolish the old Villas condos and then to build the two towers. The demolition won’t start until immediately before tower construction early next year.
Genesis won’t build the second apartment tower until it sees how the market responds to the first tower.
“The second tower really has a lot to do with how successful we are with the first,” Ip said. “We’re not rushing to build both at the same time.”
Financing still in the works
Financing on the 2.3-acre project also has not been finalized. Ip said there has been a lot of interest but it likely won’t all come together until various site plans with the city are complete.
The dollar value of the yet-to-be-named project hasn’t been determined yet because Genesis has yet to select a general contractor. The firm will be interviewing prospective general contractors in the next three to four months, he said. The civil engineer involved is West Lake Hills-based Consort Inc.; the structural engineer is Houston-based SCA Consulting Engineers; and the architect is Dallas-based GDA Architects.
The Villas site has entitlements to build 1.5 million square feet of space on roughly 100,000 square feet of land, according to Genesis. However, Ip said both towers combined likely won’t get close to 1.5 million square feet.
The first tower will be about 400,000 to 425,000 square feet, excluding parking. The size and height of the second building will depend on the market.
“It could range from a 30- to 35-story tower or on the hand, or it could be a 50- to 60-story tower. It depends on what is best when we get some [market] validation,” he said, of the second tower.
Both skyscrapers will be built to maximize sweeping views of the Colorado River and Austin skyline, he said.
Eve at 45 stories, the first tower would dwarf other residential high-rises in the rapidly-changing Rainey Street neighborhood – including the 34-story condo project at 70 Rainey and the 33-story condo tower at 48 East Ave.
Yet it would be several stories shy of the other two major skyscrapers duking it out to be the tallest building in Austin — the 56-story Austonian condominium high-rise and The Independent, a 58-story condominium high-rise under construction in the Central Business District.
Sticking with apartments
Unlike the nearby 48 East — which recently switched from an apartment project to condos — Genesis decided to keep its proposal as an apartment project because Ip said there is still a demand for rental housing downtown.
Rental rates haven’t been finalized either, but they won't be ultra high-end, Ip said.
“We’re not needing to be the highest [rent] in the marketplace,” he said. “We’re not trying to build the Ritz-Carlton or the Four Seasons of Austin.”
Yet the rates likely will reflect the desirability of a downtown, waterfront site with access to the hike-and-bike trail and “hotel-like” amenities, he noted.
Ip said the firm was drawn to the site because of its proximity to the river, not because of its proximity to the popular nightlife scene on Rainey Street.
“We’re a site that’s tied to the back-to-nature scene rather than the night vibe,” he said. “We’re not envisioning our project to be a Vegas tower next to the Strip.”
Austin-based Sutton Co. first hatched the idea for the high-rise. Initially it was going to buy the Villas condos from the individual owners in partnership with Koa Partners. But last year Sutton Co. agreed to reassign the contract to Genesis Real Estate, which turned around and purchased the project directly from the individual condo owners and the homeowners association, according to Genesis. Sutton retained some residual financial interest but is no longer substantially involved, Ip said.
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