Tag Archives: real estate

The Punk Rock Flea Market is coming back to Capitol Hill — Here’s when it will open and how long it might stay

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(Image: Punk Rock Flea Market)

What began in an abandoned basement bar beneath the Low Income Housing Institute headquarters in Belltown led to the birth of the Punk Rock Flea Market. This June, PRFM will hold its first weekend sale in the former QFC on 15th Ave E that has been shuttered since 2021 to activate that space until the building is demolished to make way for new housing and new businesses.

“We’re ‘punk rock’ because we’re collaborative and very DIY, not because we adhere to any particular fashion or music choices. We’re open and friendly and weird, and everyone is welcome to buy and sell with us,” Joshua Okrent, PRFM founder, tells CHS.

While the public process and financing pathway for redevelopment can be lengthy and bumpy, the property’s developer Hunters Capital has been searching for short-term tenants to try to keep the block active until the six-story, 170-unit, mixed-use development with about 10,000 square feet of ground floor commercial space can dig in.

“The Punk Rock Flea Market will be here through the end of the year and will continue on a month-to-month basis next year,” Jill Cronauer, chief operating officer of Hunters Capital, told CHS.

The agreement means there will be time for multiple PRFM event over the coming months. The first is planned for June 22nd and 23rd the weekend before the big 2024 Pride festivities. Continue reading →

For a million or so bucks, you can preserve the midcentury modern Central District home of Victor Steinbrueck

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“This is an urban oasis sited on a wooded corner lot, featuring 10’ ceilings, floor-to-ceiling glass along the west side, and a ribbon of corrugated glass skylights along the east roof line, providing ample daylight,” the listing boasts.

A home designed by a father of Seattle’s Space Needle and an architect remembered for his efforts to preserve Pioneer Square and Pike Place Market has hit the Central Seattle real estate market at 14th and Spring.

The 1950-built, 1,100-square-foot midcentury modern home was designed by Victor Steinbrueck, “a celebrated pioneer in Seattle’s historic preservation who also drafted early concept designs for the Space Needle,” as his own residence, the listing boasts. Continue reading →

There is a lot of empty office space on 11th Ave. WeWork fizzled. CENTRL Office is moving in.

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The real estate listing for the Kelly Springfield office space floors

 

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The big hopes of global office space giant WeWork leasing an entire Capitol Hill building went poof earlier this year. A smaller, West Coast office space giant is moving in.

Portland-based CENTRL Office has a deal for a new lease to take over the former WeWork floors of 11th Ave’s Kelly Springfield development, the preservation incentive-boosted, five-story office development that rises above the auto row-era bones of the neighborhood’s former Value Village.

CHS reported on WeWork shuttering the ambitious Capitol Hill location earlier this year amid the company’s massive bankruptcy.

The Kelly Springfield project from property owner Legacy Commercial and architects at Ankrom Moisan created three stories of new offices over the old auto row-era structure. That building was once the neighborhood’s Value Village and before that, REI, and long before that, the Kelly Springfield Motor Truck Company. CHS reported on the history and plans for the property in 2017 as the final designs for the project came together. Continue reading →

Capitol Hill’s Coastal Kitchen boarded up as real estate deal apparently off the table

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Thanks to a reader for the picture

An important deal for the stability of the 15th Ave E business core has apparently fallen through.

Large “for sale” signage has been put up on top of the plywood panels covering the shuttered Coastal Kitchen following last month’s announcement that the restaurant and its building had been sold.

CHS reported in early February on the announcement from the Sound Restaurant Family company that includes the Mioposto pizza chain as well as a roster of South Sound venues including The Poodle Dog in Fife that it had a deal to sell the Capitol Hill Coastal property to new ownership bringing a new concept to the building that has housed the restaurant for more than 30 years. Continue reading →

Another cool old Community Roots Housing apartment building hits market but affordable developer says Capitol Hill sales are not a trend

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(Image: Community Roots Housing)

Affordable housing developer Community Roots Housing has put another of its classic Capitol Hill apartment buildings on the market but the organization says not to expect a continued selloff of its smaller-scale holdings around the central city.

“We’re not in the business of selling buildings,” a representative said about the planned sale of the Park Hill building, the 1907-era, three-story masonry apartment building at 13th and Madison.

The organization announced plans to put the 30-unit building on the market last month and began the process of working with residents to find new homes. The spokesperson said people living in affordable units can be placed elsewhere int the Community Roots “portfolio” and that the developer has gone “well beyond city requirements” in assisting those in market-rate units if they choose to move out. Continue reading →

The Fredonia: Sale means new life for 115-year-old Capitol Hill apartment building with proceeds helping to create ‘hundreds of affordable units’ in Seattle

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(Image: Community Roots Housing)

Affordable housing provider and developer Community Roots Housing has sold the 115-year-old, three-story, 12-unit Fredonia building bringing more change to the built environment along Capitol Hill’s 15th Ave E and illustrating there remains a strong market for even the Hill’s oldest and smallest apartment buildings.

It is a free market — the buyer won’t be an affordable property manager or a Public Development Authority. It won’t be the city’s newly formed but not yet operational Seattle Social Housing developer. According to King County property records, the buyer is real estate investor Bryan Syrdal and Tributary Investments, a company that purchases and develops mixed-use properties with market-rate rents. The price for the Fredonia? $5 million.

Tributary has not responded to CHS inquiries but a spokesperson for Community Roots said the sale makes sense for the organization to move on from a historic building with only a handful of units and “a lot of capital needs.” The proceeds from the sale will help Community Roots provide “hundreds of affordable units” elsewhere in the city, the spokesperson said.

UPDATE: Syrdal tells CHS he is looking forward to renovating the building.

“I own and have renovated a number of older properties and used to sit on the Ballard Landmark’s board,” Syrdal writes. “My partners at Meriwether Partners have renovated and own projects of a similar profile.”

Continue reading →

Developer behind big Seattle Old Spaghetti Factory project buys little Capitol Hill office building property

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The Auto Accessories building lurks in red

A developer known for some ambitious Seattle projects including the transformation of the city’s auto row-era Old Spaghetti Factory warehouse into a commercial and residential project is now the proud owner a 1969-built Capitol Hill office building.

Meriwether Partners could be interested in the office space at 13th and Pine but it is also possible that the developer creating the Ainsworth & Dunn renovation and new construction project down toward Elliott Bay has larger plans for the 7,600-foot Capitol Hill property formerly home to a real estate office.

The $3.8 million price tag might be an indication. Continue reading →

Development firm has deal for boarded-up E Olive Way/Denny property once home to In the Bowl, Bus Stop, and Coffee Messiah — UPDATE

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(Image: CHS)

With multiple commercial buildings boarded up and fenced off, the curve of E Olive Way has seen better days. But investor interest remains and a deal reached quietly last year should put one key block on a new path.

CHS has learned Guntower Capital, a holding company formed by executives at two Seattle-area real estate and development firms, is in agreement to purchase the half acre or so property once home to a mix of businesses including the former In the Bowl, the departed Bus Stop bar and Coffee Messiah cafe and a sprawling dog lounge charred in a 2017 fire at the corner of E Olive Way and E Denny Way.

Financial terms of the deal have not been publicly disclosed and CHS is waiting to find out more from Guntower but a memorandum of purchase and sale agreement for the 1924-built, auto-row era structures was signed in August and filed with the county in late November by the investors and the longtime Lu family ownership that has held the property since a $1 million purchase in 1987. Continue reading →

Here’s what it will cost for you to reopen the Capitol Hill Gaybucks

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Want to see new life in the E Olive Way retail building left empty by the abrupt departure of Starbucks?

It is back on the market and looking for a new tenant.

A notice posted to Craigslist before the Thanksgiving holiday has listed a “Former Coffee Shop/Cafe For Lease” at an undisclosed Capitol Hill location.

“Former coffee shop for lease in Capitol Hill,” it reads. “Standalone building with dedicated parking/parking lot. Turnkey opportunity for new user to come in and open up quickly. Great street presence, exposure, signage and foot traffic.” Continue reading →

Predicted real estate tax slowdown has Seattle City Hall scrambling on 2023 budget

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A predicted slowdown in tax collected on the sale of real estate means belt tightening at Seattle City Hall (Image: Seattle.gov)

The Seattle City Council’s process to finalize the city’s budget will be delayed a week and proposed additional spending will face even greater challenges as the latest budget forecasting at City Hall predicts a nearly $80 million revenue shortfall over the next two years over slowdowns in key sectors of the economy.

Budget chair Teresa Mosqueda announced the new forecasts and schedule Wednesday. The city is predicting “a net $64 million decrease in Real Estate Excise Tax revenues,” “a net decrease of $9.4 million in general fund revenues,” and “a net decrease of $4.5 million in revenues from the Sweetened Beverage Tax.”

Mosqueda said the council’s “balancing package” of proposed amendments for the new budget will be delayed a week to Monday, November 14th. Continue reading →