Last week the Washington Post announced a new blog network to be hosted on their site called All Opinions Are Local. From their announcement: "A group of independent bloggers from around the region have agreed to come together in this space to share their thoughts and insights on important local issues. Some of what they provide will be original to this blog, some of it will be excerpted from postings on their home sites ..."
The inaugural members are: David Alpert of Greater Greater Washington, Kenny Burns of Maryland Politics Today, Paige Winfield Cunningham of Old Dominion Watchdog, Peter Galuszka of Bacon's Rebellion, Dan Malouff of BeyondDC, Christopher 'Topher' Mathews of The Georgetown Metropolitan and Sommer Mathis of DCist.
We'll keep an eye on it. Thanks to Borderstan for the heads up.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Washington Post on Southwest DC
Yesterday's Post covers the comeback of Southwest DC, picking up on a number of changes and themes SW blogger William Rich discussed in his Urban Igloo interview earlier this month. Developments mentioned by the Post include:
- The new 54,100-square-foot Safeway
- The return of CVS and Bank of America
- The reopening of Fourth Street
- Leases signed by Subway and another restaurant
- Three DC government agencies moving into office space
- A renovated 126-apartment building and similar size condo building
- Waterfront Station, a pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use project
- Two other major Waterfront developments awaiting financing
They quote neighborhood commission chair Andrew Litsky as saying "The bottom line is that Southwest is back. For everyone who was complaining there was a paucity of everything, they're wrong."
Thursday, April 22, 2010
The Christening of Urban Igloo's New Office
Yesterday we gathered the Urban Igloo agents in our new office. It was great to have everybody together at our new space. We are so excited to be right across from Farragut West metro and Starbucks. Stay tuned for our official open house in the coming weeks.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
April Rent Check
Read the April issue of our monthly newsletter, "Rent Check." Subscribe here so that you can get the latest news on DC real estate and neighborhoods.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Neighborhood Expert Interview: Southwest DC
One of the city’s few waterfront areas, the Southwest neighborhood of DC lies along the Washington Channel of the Potomac River. The perks of living in this up-and-coming area are overlooked by many … but not by blogger William Rich of Southwest…The Little Quadrant that Could. We recently sat down to chat with William about his neighborhood.
Thanks for joining us, William. When and why did you start blogging about Southwest?
I started blogging about Southwest in June of 2008. The neighborhood was going through a lot of changes and I thought it would be a good idea to start chronicling it and bring attention to a largely forgotten part of the city. Slowly, but surely, we’ve been getting more exposure.
What are the best things about living in your neighborhood?
It’s a relatively quiet area of the city but close to the National Mall, downtown, and Capitol Hill. It’s also well-served by public transit, including Metro, Circulator, and Metrobus. There’s easy access to Northern Virginia, which is good for me since I work in Alexandria. We have a fish market on the waterfront, which gets busy on the weekends, but the odor sometimes gets a bit overwhelming. Southwest is an ethnically diverse, largely middle-class neighborhood, and civic engagement is very active here. Housing is more affordable than other areas of the city and there’s a variety of housing types to choose from - we have condos, co-ops, apartments, townhouses, duplexes, and houseboats!
According to the Washington Post, one problem with Southwest is that it's "void of the kind of natural urban fabric of corner stores, drycleaners and other neighborhood services that are common through much of the city." Is this really a problem and, if so, how do you get around it?
Yes, this has been a problem in our neighborhood, especially since the redevelopment of the old Waterside Mall began in 2007 and most of the stores were closed to make way for a new “town center” development called Waterfront Station. At the old Waterside Mall we used to have a convenience store, drycleaners, bakery, video rental store, bank, CVS, Safeway, and several restaurants, but only the bank, CVS, and Safeway remained once redevelopment began. In mid-April a new Safeway will open and over the summer we should start to see some restaurants open up at Waterfront Station. I stopped shopping at the old Safeway years ago because it was so dirty and instead get my groceries at the City Vista Safeway or Harris Teeter, which are pretty close by car. Once the new store opens, I won’t have to travel to those other grocery stores anymore. We do have some neighborhood services scattered about, but due to urban renewal efforts in the 1950s and 1960s, our main retail centers have been concentrated at Waterside Mall and L’Enfant Plaza Promenade.
Nationals Park opened two years ago just across South Capitol Street. What impact has it had so far on Southwest?
I would have to say for the most part it has been a positive impact. A viaduct near the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge was removed during the reconstruction and beautification of South Capitol Street before Nationals Park opened, so it helped to better connect Southwest and the Capitol Riverfront. I can walk or bike easily to baseball games and the fireworks show they put on every Friday evening when the team is home is visible from my condo building. The Nationals have done charitable works in SW and hold job fairs to hire local residents. Also, the bars and restaurants along the Southwest Waterfront have seen increased business from baseball fans since there aren’t many places to go near the ballpark yet in Capitol Riverfront. However, traffic has increased in the area on game days and neighbors have complained about littering by fans.
You recently blogged about your sneak peek of the new Southwest Safeway, which opens later this month and has been getting lots of buzz. What are the highlights of the new store? How big of a deal is this for the neighborhood?
The new Southwest Safeway will be 55,000 square feet, which is about 20,000 square feet larger than the old store. With the increased size, more features have been included, such as a food court area with prepared foods, a pizza oven, sushi bar, Starbucks, and “cheese world” counter. There’s a stone-walled lounge near the front of the store with a fireplace and several seating areas. An on-site bakery will serve warm bread all day and a fancy bread slicer uses lasers to cut bread as it comes out of the oven. Other upgrades include a pharmacy, an attended meat/seafood counter, and garage parking. The new store will also sell wine and beer. This new Safeway is a huge deal since it’s the only grocery store we have in Southwest. The old Safeway was not properly serving the needs of its customers and we hope this new store will be managed better to go with all the planned upgrades and niceties.
What are the other major recent developments or upcoming changes in Southwest?
There are a lot o
f developments going on in Southwest right now that keeps me pretty busy. As a part of the development of Waterfront Station, 4th Street has been reopened between I Street and M Street, which hasn’t been around since the 1960s. Last month, two office buildings opened at Waterfront Station that now house several District agencies. A couple of condo conversions are underway – Potomac Place Tower and Waterfront Tower. Arena Stage will be reopening in October after a two year renovation and expansion. The Consolidated Forensic Laboratory, which will be home to the city’s new crime lab, is under construction in the northern part of Southwest. L’Enfant Plaza Promenade is currently undergoing a $40 million renovation. Memorials to Martin Luther King Jr. and President Eisenhower are either under construction or in the design phase. The old Randall School building on I Street will be repurposed as a boutique hotel, museum, and residential complex. A new Washington Highlands branch library is under construction in Bellevue, which is located on the east side of the Anacostia River, but still in Southwest. However, the biggest upcoming change will be the redevelopment of the Southwest Waterfront itself, which will be transformed into a world-class waterfront destination, currently in the design phase.
Please share some of your neighborhood favorites:
- Favorite bar or place to get a drink: Cantina Marina, especially around sunset because the view is amazing and the margaritas are good! It feels like I’m not in DC when I go there.
- Favorite restaurant: Jenny’s Asian Fusion
- Favorite area to walk around: My new favorite area is to walk down the newly opened 4th Street, but I also like to run on the National Mall – seeing the Capitol dome, the Washington Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial all the time never gets old.
- Favorite thing about living near the water: Strangely enough, I like hearing the horn of the cruise ships as they leave their docks in the evenings (and sometimes in the mornings). Watching the annual parade of lighted boats in December, the fireworks show during the National Cherry Blossom Festival, and other events along the water are also a treat.
- Favorite (other) DC blog: DCMud, DCist, and JDLand (our neighborhood blogger to the east and inspiration for my blog)
(Photos courtesy of William Rich)
---
Read last month’s interview on Penn Quarter with the author of the PQ Living blog.
Are you a blogger or leader in your neighborhood? Share your expertise with thousands of DC area readers of our newsletter and blog. Contact us today at info@urbanigloo.com.
Thanks for joining us, William. When and why did you start blogging about Southwest?
I started blogging about Southwest in June of 2008. The neighborhood was going through a lot of changes and I thought it would be a good idea to start chronicling it and bring attention to a largely forgotten part of the city. Slowly, but surely, we’ve been getting more exposure.
What are the best things about living in your neighborhood?
It’s a relatively quiet area of the city but close to the National Mall, downtown, and Capitol Hill. It’s also well-served by public transit, including Metro, Circulator, and Metrobus. There’s easy access to Northern Virginia, which is good for me since I work in Alexandria. We have a fish market on the waterfront, which gets busy on the weekends, but the odor sometimes gets a bit overwhelming. Southwest is an ethnically diverse, largely middle-class neighborhood, and civic engagement is very active here. Housing is more affordable than other areas of the city and there’s a variety of housing types to choose from - we have condos, co-ops, apartments, townhouses, duplexes, and houseboats!According to the Washington Post, one problem with Southwest is that it's "void of the kind of natural urban fabric of corner stores, drycleaners and other neighborhood services that are common through much of the city." Is this really a problem and, if so, how do you get around it?
Yes, this has been a problem in our neighborhood, especially since the redevelopment of the old Waterside Mall began in 2007 and most of the stores were closed to make way for a new “town center” development called Waterfront Station. At the old Waterside Mall we used to have a convenience store, drycleaners, bakery, video rental store, bank, CVS, Safeway, and several restaurants, but only the bank, CVS, and Safeway remained once redevelopment began. In mid-April a new Safeway will open and over the summer we should start to see some restaurants open up at Waterfront Station. I stopped shopping at the old Safeway years ago because it was so dirty and instead get my groceries at the City Vista Safeway or Harris Teeter, which are pretty close by car. Once the new store opens, I won’t have to travel to those other grocery stores anymore. We do have some neighborhood services scattered about, but due to urban renewal efforts in the 1950s and 1960s, our main retail centers have been concentrated at Waterside Mall and L’Enfant Plaza Promenade.
Nationals Park opened two years ago just across South Capitol Street. What impact has it had so far on Southwest?
I would have to say for the most part it has been a positive impact. A viaduct near the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge was removed during the reconstruction and beautification of South Capitol Street before Nationals Park opened, so it helped to better connect Southwest and the Capitol Riverfront. I can walk or bike easily to baseball games and the fireworks show they put on every Friday evening when the team is home is visible from my condo building. The Nationals have done charitable works in SW and hold job fairs to hire local residents. Also, the bars and restaurants along the Southwest Waterfront have seen increased business from baseball fans since there aren’t many places to go near the ballpark yet in Capitol Riverfront. However, traffic has increased in the area on game days and neighbors have complained about littering by fans.
You recently blogged about your sneak peek of the new Southwest Safeway, which opens later this month and has been getting lots of buzz. What are the highlights of the new store? How big of a deal is this for the neighborhood?
The new Southwest Safeway will be 55,000 square feet, which is about 20,000 square feet larger than the old store. With the increased size, more features have been included, such as a food court area with prepared foods, a pizza oven, sushi bar, Starbucks, and “cheese world” counter. There’s a stone-walled lounge near the front of the store with a fireplace and several seating areas. An on-site bakery will serve warm bread all day and a fancy bread slicer uses lasers to cut bread as it comes out of the oven. Other upgrades include a pharmacy, an attended meat/seafood counter, and garage parking. The new store will also sell wine and beer. This new Safeway is a huge deal since it’s the only grocery store we have in Southwest. The old Safeway was not properly serving the needs of its customers and we hope this new store will be managed better to go with all the planned upgrades and niceties.
What are the other major recent developments or upcoming changes in Southwest?
There are a lot o
f developments going on in Southwest right now that keeps me pretty busy. As a part of the development of Waterfront Station, 4th Street has been reopened between I Street and M Street, which hasn’t been around since the 1960s. Last month, two office buildings opened at Waterfront Station that now house several District agencies. A couple of condo conversions are underway – Potomac Place Tower and Waterfront Tower. Arena Stage will be reopening in October after a two year renovation and expansion. The Consolidated Forensic Laboratory, which will be home to the city’s new crime lab, is under construction in the northern part of Southwest. L’Enfant Plaza Promenade is currently undergoing a $40 million renovation. Memorials to Martin Luther King Jr. and President Eisenhower are either under construction or in the design phase. The old Randall School building on I Street will be repurposed as a boutique hotel, museum, and residential complex. A new Washington Highlands branch library is under construction in Bellevue, which is located on the east side of the Anacostia River, but still in Southwest. However, the biggest upcoming change will be the redevelopment of the Southwest Waterfront itself, which will be transformed into a world-class waterfront destination, currently in the design phase.Please share some of your neighborhood favorites:
- Favorite bar or place to get a drink: Cantina Marina, especially around sunset because the view is amazing and the margaritas are good! It feels like I’m not in DC when I go there.
- Favorite restaurant: Jenny’s Asian Fusion
- Favorite area to walk around: My new favorite area is to walk down the newly opened 4th Street, but I also like to run on the National Mall – seeing the Capitol dome, the Washington Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial all the time never gets old.
- Favorite thing about living near the water: Strangely enough, I like hearing the horn of the cruise ships as they leave their docks in the evenings (and sometimes in the mornings). Watching the annual parade of lighted boats in December, the fireworks show during the National Cherry Blossom Festival, and other events along the water are also a treat.
- Favorite (other) DC blog: DCMud, DCist, and JDLand (our neighborhood blogger to the east and inspiration for my blog)
(Photos courtesy of William Rich)
---
Read last month’s interview on Penn Quarter with the author of the PQ Living blog.
Are you a blogger or leader in your neighborhood? Share your expertise with thousands of DC area readers of our newsletter and blog. Contact us today at info@urbanigloo.com.
Examining DC Rent Control, Part II
In Part I of our interview on DC rent control, we covered the policy’s history and some of the arguments surrounding it. Now we shift our focus to the real-world impact of these laws and practical options for improving rent control in the District.
We are joined again by two longtime DC rent control experts: K. David Meit, CPM, principal at Oculus Realty, LLC, and Mark Policy, attorney at Greenstein DeLorme & Luchs, P.C.
Mark, do you think rent control laws have done more harm or good for DC renters? For DC landlords?
The focus should be on maintaining and improving the availability of housing, not on tenants and housing providers. The main problem with rent control in the District of Columbia is that it does not distinguish among renters – rich renters, poor renters, old renters, young renters, renters on Connectic
ut Avenue and renters in poor areas of the city are all treated alike under rent control. Some tenants need rent protection and many do not. This blunderbuss, broad scale approach creates unsupportable economics and a notoriously incomprehensible rent control system. It adversely affects the quality and availability of housing in the District of Columbia and sets tenants and housing providers at odds with one another – tenants vigorously demand the lowest rent and housing providers are therefore less inclined to invest further in an aged housing stock. That does no good for the tenants who have to live in this housing, or for the housing providers who supply this housing. Rent control also allows the District Government to pass the economic responsibility for housing onto housing providers, rather than creating District Government programs which use the tax dollars of all citizens as a whole to focus on subsidizing renters who truly do need assistance.
David, what do you think?
Rent control has only been good for the politicians. Neither housing providers nor renters benefit. DC rent control generally applies to rental housing built in or before 1975. Due to this, the largest stock of affordable housing is slowing falling apart due to age. With no incentive to invest
in long-term repair and maintenance many properties will eventually become uninhabitable. The politicians would argue there are “petition” avenues housing providers may take to earn a return on capital investment. However, the time, money and expertise required to successfully navigate the arcane bureaucracy is not available to vast majority of small, mom and pop, property owners who own most of the housing covered by the Act. Furthermore, the “returns” offered through the petition process are often finite, offering no longer term value appreciation beyond the mere preservation of the asset.
In addition, due to the lack of any means testing, many high quality apartment homes in desirable neighborhoods are often rented at the fraction of their market value to those who least need it, such as first year associate at law firms earning over $100,000 per year. Teachers, firefighters and police rarely get the opportunity.
Mark, is rent control likely to go away in DC anytime soon?
No. Few attorneys use the unqualified answer “no”, but I just did.
David, what are some feasible steps we could take to improve the rent control situation for DC renters and landlords in the near term?
Housing is not an entitlement. However, society has collectively agreed it has an obligation to help those in need. Because of this, government is responsible for providing affordable housing. In DC, rent control unfairly singles out a specific set of housing providers (those who own pre-1973 building) and forces them to offer below market (and often below cost) housing. Government is shirking its responsibility under the current rent control regime.
To improve DC rent control, the City Council should look no farther than New York City. For example, NYC has preserved affordable housing for seniors through its Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption (SCRIE) program that reduces property taxes dollar for dollar in return for keeping rents affordable. In this case, the cost is born by the government (through reduced tax income), not the housing provider. In 1997 NYC also enacted means testing and high rent exemptions.
---
Read Part I of our interview on DC Rent Control.
Have questions for our experts? Contact David here and contact Mark here.
Are you a local real estate expert interested in sharing insights and tips with thousands of renters, landlords, and other Urban Igloo followers? We’d love to interview you for our blog and newsletter! Contact us today at info@urbanigloo.com.
We are joined again by two longtime DC rent control experts: K. David Meit, CPM, principal at Oculus Realty, LLC, and Mark Policy, attorney at Greenstein DeLorme & Luchs, P.C.
Mark, do you think rent control laws have done more harm or good for DC renters? For DC landlords?
The focus should be on maintaining and improving the availability of housing, not on tenants and housing providers. The main problem with rent control in the District of Columbia is that it does not distinguish among renters – rich renters, poor renters, old renters, young renters, renters on Connectic
ut Avenue and renters in poor areas of the city are all treated alike under rent control. Some tenants need rent protection and many do not. This blunderbuss, broad scale approach creates unsupportable economics and a notoriously incomprehensible rent control system. It adversely affects the quality and availability of housing in the District of Columbia and sets tenants and housing providers at odds with one another – tenants vigorously demand the lowest rent and housing providers are therefore less inclined to invest further in an aged housing stock. That does no good for the tenants who have to live in this housing, or for the housing providers who supply this housing. Rent control also allows the District Government to pass the economic responsibility for housing onto housing providers, rather than creating District Government programs which use the tax dollars of all citizens as a whole to focus on subsidizing renters who truly do need assistance.David, what do you think?
Rent control has only been good for the politicians. Neither housing providers nor renters benefit. DC rent control generally applies to rental housing built in or before 1975. Due to this, the largest stock of affordable housing is slowing falling apart due to age. With no incentive to invest
in long-term repair and maintenance many properties will eventually become uninhabitable. The politicians would argue there are “petition” avenues housing providers may take to earn a return on capital investment. However, the time, money and expertise required to successfully navigate the arcane bureaucracy is not available to vast majority of small, mom and pop, property owners who own most of the housing covered by the Act. Furthermore, the “returns” offered through the petition process are often finite, offering no longer term value appreciation beyond the mere preservation of the asset.In addition, due to the lack of any means testing, many high quality apartment homes in desirable neighborhoods are often rented at the fraction of their market value to those who least need it, such as first year associate at law firms earning over $100,000 per year. Teachers, firefighters and police rarely get the opportunity.
Mark, is rent control likely to go away in DC anytime soon?
No. Few attorneys use the unqualified answer “no”, but I just did.
David, what are some feasible steps we could take to improve the rent control situation for DC renters and landlords in the near term?
Housing is not an entitlement. However, society has collectively agreed it has an obligation to help those in need. Because of this, government is responsible for providing affordable housing. In DC, rent control unfairly singles out a specific set of housing providers (those who own pre-1973 building) and forces them to offer below market (and often below cost) housing. Government is shirking its responsibility under the current rent control regime.
To improve DC rent control, the City Council should look no farther than New York City. For example, NYC has preserved affordable housing for seniors through its Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption (SCRIE) program that reduces property taxes dollar for dollar in return for keeping rents affordable. In this case, the cost is born by the government (through reduced tax income), not the housing provider. In 1997 NYC also enacted means testing and high rent exemptions.
---
Read Part I of our interview on DC Rent Control.
Have questions for our experts? Contact David here and contact Mark here.
Are you a local real estate expert interested in sharing insights and tips with thousands of renters, landlords, and other Urban Igloo followers? We’d love to interview you for our blog and newsletter! Contact us today at info@urbanigloo.com.
Friday, April 9, 2010
WSJ: Real estate market showing signs of recovery
The Wall Street Journal recently wrote that after five quarters of decline, apartment rents rose during the first quarter, indicating that the real estate market is finally recovering from its recession-induced slump.
"Nationally, effective rents, which include concessions such as one month of free rent, rose 0.3% during the quarter compared with a 0.7% decline in the fourth quarter of last year and a 1.1% drop in the first quarter of 2009. Vacancies are tied to unemployment, because many would-be renters move in with family members or double up during a downturn [...] Renters are also staying put longer: the average renter now stays for 19 months, up from an average of 14 months, said Mr. Friedman [chief executive of Associated Estates Realty Corp], and despite low mortgage rates and greater home affordability, fewer renters are leaving to buy homes. 'This is the first time in many, many years that it feels like even people who could afford to buy are making the investment decision not to,' Mr. Friedman said."While the recovery will be a slow one and "landlords shouldn't expect 'galloping rental growth' until the job market firms up," this increase in rents is a positive sign if you're a condo owner or property manager--especially given that many experts were not forecasting rental growth until the third and fourth quarters of 2010.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)