American Urban Renissance

[mhays]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Permits and construction aren't exactly the same, but they aren't apples and oranges either. There's a very strong relationship between the two.

The reporter claimed that there was some massive change in metropolitan development pattens, yet the Census numbers say the opposite. I would trust Census data over claims from a newspaper reporter or real estate broker.

Not really.

Imagine a 50% split between urban and suburban land use permits in a three-year period. It's entirely logical for to have a 20/80% split (for example) in residential groundbreakings in a period of one or two years, if the suburban projects haven't penciled but the urban projects have.

Not sure why you're talking about census numbers. Those are history, not about what's getting built.

[Jelly Roll]

Originally Posted by mhays

Not really.

Imagine a 50% split between urban and suburban land use permits in a three-year period. It's entirely logical for to have a 20/80% split (for example) in residential groundbreakings in a period of one or two years, if the suburban projects haven't penciled but the urban projects have.

Not sure why you're talking about census numbers. Those are history, not about what's getting built.

In NJ the state posts occupancy permits for new construction. I think it gives a good indication of how many units are actually being absorbed by the market at a given time. I wonder if there is something similiar for Texas.

[atlantaguy]

It would seem Crawford simply needs to peruse the VERY comprehensive Houston construction thread.

The evidence is pretty overwhelming that the Houstonians here are NOT blowing smoke when it comes to the massive infill taking place inside the Loop.

[mhays]

Impressive amount of infill, but I have a hard time using "massive" unless it's many thousands of units. I don't call Seattle's growth massive though an area equal to 10% of Houston's inner loop about the same number of units under construction. On a world scale, massive would be tens of thousands.

[atlantaguy]

Originally Posted by mhays

Impressive amount of infill, but I have a hard time using "massive" unless it's many thousands of units. I don't call Seattle's growth massive though an area equal to 10% of Houston's inner loop about the same number of units under construction. On a world scale, massive would be tens of thousands.

Massive as in areas that have formerly layed fallow are now joining in with the continued growth typically seen in select areas to the SW that are used to continual growth and infill. The entire Eastside is still pretty much a no-go area, so as of now that huge chunk of the city is not even included. The infill is not occuring inside the entire inner Loop - it is largely concentrated between Downtown and the Galleria. This is a game changer for Houston.

As usual, I have a feeling if this boom was happening in an "older and colder" city in the country, it wouldn't be questioned or discounted to such an extent. I believe in giving credit where credit is due.

[fflint]

Originally Posted by atlantaguy

As usual, I have a feeling if this boom was happening in an "older and colder" city in the country, it wouldn't be questioned or discounted to such an extent. I believe in giving credit where credit is due.

Far too often on this forum people decry the purported workings of a nefarious bias when more reasonable explanations are present--forumers live in far-flung corners of a continent that is seeing a tremendous amount of urban infill, so things we feel deserve wide notice and acclaim outside our respective cities...well, they just don't. For example, San Francisco is "older and colder" than Houston yet nobody on the forum even knows we've currently got over 4,300 infill units under construction.

[atlantaguy]

Originally Posted by fflint

Far too often on this forum people decry the purported workings of a nefarious bias when more reasonable explanations are present--forumers live in far-flung corners of a continent that is seeing a tremendous amount of urban infill, so things we feel deserve wide notice and acclaim outside our respective cities...well, they just don't. For example, San Francisco is "older and colder" than Houston yet nobody on the forum even knows we've currently got over 4,300 infill units under construction.

Excellent point fflint, and duly noted.

I agree, this is HUGE for San Francisco - and fantastic news after all the years of practically zero new residential. I'm taking it that the uber-NIMBY forces have somehow been tempered for this to be taking place.

[photoLith]

Yes, all you Houston defamers should come visit. I go out everyday pretty much and take photos of Houston infill going on right now and theres huge amounts of it and most of its very urban. And we havent even seen the tip of the iceberg this year. Next year and in 2014, tons of huge urban projects will be taking off all inside the 610 loop, mainly in Montrose and River Oaks, but the once ghetto area of the East of Downtown hood is rapidly being developed also, albeit into crappy not so urban very expensive lofts but these lofts are going up near the new soccer stadium and near where the future light rail line is opening up. Houstons downtown and inner city is changing rapidly, its an incredible site to see. Most of the new lofts and urban development is happening within this outlined area on this map for those who dont know. https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid...12271,0.891953

[urbanactivist]

Is it worth noting that the building boom has been going in Austin and Dallas too? Someone seeing a picture of the Austin skyline from 2005 would barely recognize it today. Dallas has really led Texas in terms of infill development... Uptown has mostly built up over the last twenty years. The Victory area is by all accounts a "boom" development. Truth be told when compared to other major urban cores in Texas, Houston is just catching up to the pace that they've experienced for a while. Why is this so difficult a concept for people to comprehend? If y'all want to hold on to the "sea of parking lots" notion of central Houston, be my guest. But it just doesn't match the reality of this city in the 21st century. And photolith is right... we may not have anymore downtown skyscrapers in the pipe, but the mid-rise and infill party is expected to continue at least through 2014. Doesn't hurt that our real estate market never crashed and burned either.

[mhays]

I'm duly impressed by the amount of infill in these cities. But as a contractor I never take "planned" projects as much more than potentials until they break ground, regardless of "having financing" and other stuff commonly believed by some of the newer forumers.

[LtBk]

Stupid question, but what's the best way to find out the amount of residential units being built in a city?

[Dralcoffin]

For reference, a quick Google search gives a figure of 3150 units being built in Chicago. My sense is that Chicago, more than many cities, is a very bifurcated city. On one hand, the central core and the North Side are some of the most revitalized, busiest neighborhoods in the country outside of New York. But on the other hand, huge swaths of the West and South Sides, with populations larger than most cities on their own, are in worse shape than ever before. The city population is dropping from the immense exodus (especially among blacks) out of the West and South Sides being several times the number of people flooding back downtown, but iirc the average income in the city has increased since 2000 and the number of households is closer to steady than the population is. This next decade, I hope the stirrings of revitalization move farther out and the collapse of the poorer neighborhoods can be slowed.

[mhays]

Originally Posted by LtBk

Stupid question, but what's the best way to find out the amount of residential units being built in a city?

Depends. Every city counts things their own way. I'm not aware of a central authority like the Census Dept. having numbers, though they do count occupied units, etc., imperfectly of course.

Land use permits are too removed from actual construction to mean much. Building permits are less removed but are still somewhat. And each city has its own processes, particularly on the land use side.

Many cities have reports from their building department that summarize things in whatever way. If you're lucky they'll summarize numbers about habitable units constructed, rather than land use or building permits. These reports are probably historical....break ground in July 2012 and it'll show up in the 2014 retrospective in 2015.

Seattle has a retrospective like that...permits "finaled," per year by neighborhood per year, minus units subtracted. It was just updated this month (score!). Summarizing, from 1995-2004 we added a net 24,377 units, or 2,437 per year. From 2005-2012 we added 27,978. Of that, the 2011 and 2012 numbers are only lightly populated because not many completed in 2011, and 2012 counts six month. It was 24,647 2005-2010, or 4,107 per year. The 2012 and 2013 numbers will be above that as something like 8,000 are underway now. It's a fascinating report...summarizing each year down to neighborhoods. Another 13,170 are permitted, which I assume means building permit. http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/cms/group...dpdp022071.pdf

[miketoronto]

What if very few of these people moving into downtown and inner city condos are actually moving in from the suburbs (and therefore changing lifestyles)?

A report done on downtown dwellers a couple years ago by the City of Toronto, showed that most new downtown residents actually came from the existing inner city or to some extent from other parts of the City of Toronto (inner suburban areas, but not as much as who came from other inner city neighbourhoods). While a small small percentage came from the outer suburbs.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by LtBk

Stupid question, but what's the best way to find out the amount of residential units being built in a city?

All major cities and counties report new building permits to the Census, with data organized by month.

http://censtats.census.gov/bldg/bldgprmt.shtml

[mhays]

I didn't know about that, thanks.

Still, it's just permits, of whichever type.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by mhays

I didn't know about that, thanks.

Still, it's just permits, of whichever type.

Yes, but it's reported permits going back many years. It's the best data we have re. housing unit construction.

You will never get something better, because there's no such thing as "new units added". It could be new construction units, renovated units, uncombined units, etc.

Cities don't track that info, at least not within the context of new vs. old units. There is tax data that could be tracked (trying to track net changes in unit counts by building lot) but it would be even less accurate than the Census data.

[Gordo]

Originally Posted by atlantaguy

Excellent point fflint, and duly noted.

I agree, this is HUGE for San Francisco - and fantastic news after all the years of practically zero new residential. I'm taking it that the uber-NIMBY forces have somehow been tempered for this to be taking place.

Take a look at this report for the net change in the number of units by year:

http://www.sf-planning.org/ftp/files...ory_Report.pdf

Page 6 has the most interesting table (splits units into new construction, alterations, tear-downs, net increase). From that, you can see that numbers were low in the mid-90's (especially because "alterations" were leading to a loss of units, meaning the small number of new construction units were partially offset by units being combined, etc), but it's been quite a while since we've seen practically zero residential. With ~2300 units added on average during each year of the last decade, that means that at any given time 3500-5000 were under construction.

[brian_b]

The Postal Service will have the most comprehensive list, but they probably don't get involved until fairly late in the construction stage. They need to put each dwelling unit into a ZIP+4 bucket (the highrise apartment building I live in has at least 3 ZIP+4s) and they also need to know about the construction & occupancy status before they start residential delivery service.

I once lived in a new townhouse development that was finished except for landscaping. We had to pick up our mail at the local Post Office. A few days after the heavy landscaping equipment was taken away, mail started showing up in our mailboxes. So they are definitely getting timely and very granular info about residential construction.

[fflint]

For the SF list, a couple forumers took the lead in coordinating a tally of units under construction by sifting through media reports and press releases, and enlisting the rest of us in conducting Internet searches for info on construction projects we have noticed from the street. For instance, there's a new building going up on my corner which I Googled to discover how many units it will have, and the project was then added to the tally.

SF is a very compact city, so whenever a new four or six story building is going up we forumers are, collectively, likely to notice it. I'd imagine there are smaller projects we may have missed, but I'm confident we've got a pretty good picture of how many new units are under construction. I would assume it would be harder to manually count new units in a more extensive municipality.