Hines project: A West Coast landmark.
Hines project: A West Coast landmark.
The Houston real estate developer that built the tallest building in town, downtown’s 75- story JPMorgan Chase Tower, is about to do it again on theWest Coast.
Hines recently received approval from the city of San Francisco to build a 61- story, 1.4 million- square- foot tower next to the Transbay Transit Center.
The proposed Transbay Tower was designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects and will soar to a height of 1,070 feet. Hines says it will be the tallest skyscraper on theWest Coast.
The project is a joint venture with Boston Properties. The companies are buying the site from the Transbay Joint Powers Authority for about $ 190 million.
The involvement of Boston Properties took Hines over a significant hurdle. Over the summer, the developer lost its investment partner, MetLife, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Chairman Gerald Hines said last week in a statement: “We are very gratified to have both a stellar partner and the city’s nod of approval. We think the tower will be a beautiful addition to San Francisco’s beloved skyline as well as an extremely desirable and sustainable workplace next to one of the state’s busiest transit hubs.”
The building will be part of a $ 4 billion transportation and housing project in downtown San Francisco that will replace the former Transbay Terminal with a modern regional transit hub.
The project is a national model for environmentally friendly transitoriented development, Hines said.
Sprouts to sprout
As Houston’s Inner Loop becomes more saturated with grocery stores, another player is close to entering the fray.
Sprouts FarmersMarket, which recently signed leases for three suburban stores, is considering a site inside Loop 610, said Ed Page, the grocer’s realestate broker for this area.
The Phoenix- based specialty shop could open as many as 18 stores here over the next five years, including several in closein locations.
“Like all retailers, what they want to do is get their toehold in the market, learn the market and determine from there what the saturation point is,” said Page, managing partner of UCR moodyrambin PAGE.
The competition is getting fierce.
Trader Joe’s recently opened in the former Alabama theater and is planning more stores. On Friday, a Kroger and a Walmart both opened in nearby spots close to the Heights.
Pagewon’t disclose the potential location of the grocer’s first Inner Loop store until the deal is final.
Securing the urban sites, he said, can be tricky.
With demand for highend apartments on the rise, residential developers area willing to pay top dollar for Inner Loop sites. They’re grabbling those sites as fast as they can.
“It’s justmuch more difficult than going out in a suburban location,” Page said.
Sprouts, he said, markets to “educate customers” and specializes in produce and supplements. The average store size is around 25,000 square feet. That’s about a third of the size of a typical neighborhood grocery store.
Sprouts will introduce its first local markets next year in the suburbs: at Cinco Ranch Boulevard and Peek Road; in the Copperfield Village Shopping Center at FM529 and Texas 6; and in Spring Cypress Village at FM 249 and Spring Cypress Road.
New homes sell better
The residential building industry is still way down from its peak, but the market for new homes is gaining steam.
Buyers closed on 6,014 newly constructed homes in the third quarter, according to a report from Metrostudy, a residential consulting and research firm. That’s 11 percent higher than the same period a year ago, when this area was beginning its recovery.
Since October 2011, closings are up 15 percent.
The demand has resulted in a spike in new construction.
More than 7,500 homes were being built at the end of the third quarter, a 43 percent increase from the activity at the same point in 2011, the report said.
There are fewer empty homes waiting for buyers, too.
The supply of homes sitting finished and vacant has fallen 19 percent since the third quarter of last year.
The market’s peak was in 2006 when builders started 49,462 homes.