Residential Real Estate News

Stokes West gets go-ahead

By Ken Prendergast / May 19, 2023

Developers of a large apartment complex in Cleveland’s University Circle could start construction of the $40 million project before August if all goes well in the coming weeks. That optimism was earned today after City Planning Commission gave the project final approval of its new, overhauled design and a zoning change to accommodate that design. The development is different from several others nearby because it isn’t trying to brush with or break through the top of the market when it comes to rents. Instead, Stokes West intends to offer smaller, more affordable apartments, many of them already furnished for new arrivals in Cleveland and from across the world.

As Duck Island fills, Berges goes SOLO

By Ken Prendergast / May 19, 2023

Don’t tell Matt Berges that new home construction in the U.S. is in a 15-month-long slump. The owner of Cleveland-based housing development firm Berges Home Performance LLC will tell you that success depends on what you’re building and where. The where in this case is the near-West Side, specifically Duck Island, a neighborhood Berges helped rebuild. But it is running out of space for more new homes, prompting the 23-year-old firm to look elsewhere to satisfy an as-yet insatiable housing demand.

Six local housing projects win tax credits

By Ken Prendergast / May 18, 2023

Six housing developments in Cuyahoga County won federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTCs) yesterday from the Ohio Housing Finance Agency (OHFA), improving their chances of seeing construction in the near future. Those projects and 23 others elsewhere around the state received conditional LIHTC commitments. Developers will use those awards to leverage additional financing in the creation or rehabilitation of rental housing for low- to moderate-income Ohioans.

The Standard hits the market

By Ken Prendergast / May 12, 2023

Not all high-rise office and other commercial buildings in downtown Cleveland convert well to residential uses. And then there’s the historic Standard Building, 99 W. St. Clair Ave., which seemed a natural to become home to hundreds of people in the heart of the city. And now the timing is right for the company which bought and redeveloped The Standard to offer it for sale.

Stokes West redesigned

By Ken Prendergast / May 3, 2023

It seems every real estate developer is having similar problems — supply constraints, rising construction materials costs and rising interest rates. Only those projects that are charging top-of-the-market rents, have investors with low expectations for returns on investment, or received a ton of subsidies are getting built. So when Stokes West, which intends to offer apartment rents that are 13-21 percent lower than its peers in and near University Circle, got design approval by City Planning Commission last summer, it was already facing an uphill climb. That changed when the development team joined forces with Geis Construction Inc. and found a way to deliver the project more affordably.

Millennia’s Centennial due this year

By Ken Prendergast / April 28, 2023

Although a “groundbreaking” ceremony for the start of one of downtown Cleveland’s largest-ever building renovations may not happen until late summer, you may see work crews going in and out of the former Union Trust Bank, 925 Euclid Ave., even earlier. That’s because an interior demolition permit application was submitted to the city this week to prepare for construction work in converting the 1.4-million-square-foot behemoth into The Centennial, featuring nearly 600 apartments, 170 hotel rooms, plus retail, restaurants and a museum.

Little Italy, Tremont townhouses planned

By Ken Prendergast / April 25, 2023

A Cleveland real estate firm that has been renovating homes in the metro area is entering the new-construction market by building new homes in Sandusky and seeking to construct new townhomes in two of Cleveland’s hottest neighborhoods. ParaPrin Construction, located on West 105th Street, wants to construct six new townhomes in Little Italy and Tremont if its vision passes muster with the City Planning Commission.

Chester 82 gets thumbs up

By Ken Prendergast / April 24, 2023

When the Cleveland Planning Commission gave final approval of design plans on April 21 for the Chester 82 development, 1898 E. 82nd St., it coincided with the federal government’s release of the latest jobs data for Greater Cleveland. That data offered a reminder of why Chester 82 and other residential developments in Cleveland’s Hough neighborhood are happening.

The West Shore also rises

By Ken Prendergast / April 21, 2023

In the coming weeks and months, the continued metamorphosis of land uses along Cleveland’s West Shoreway from industrial to residential will yield some new features that will show just how much Cleveland is changing. Several projects along the Shoreway-turned-Edgewater Parkway will be under way at roughly the same time and offer some lofty symbols about Clevelanders’ evolving regard for its often-ignored lakefront.

Treo opening doors on West 25th

By Ken Prendergast / April 10, 2023

Treo, named for where Tremont meets Ohio City, is the first of the big, market-rate apartment buildings to come to this no-man’s land part of town. Built on the site of a former auto repair and scrap yard business along a lesser-traveled section of West 25th Street, Treo’s first resident moved into the 171-unit property last week as construction work is substantially completed.