Friday, March 9, 2012

Housing News Digest, March 9

California firm pays $20.4 million for Springs apartment complex

A California real estate company has made another big purchase of a Colorado Springs apartment complex.

Seagate Properties Inc., based north of San Francisco, has paid $20.4 million for the 310-unit Sunset Creek Apartments, southwest of Interstate 25 and North Nevada Avenue.

It’s the company’s second local apartment purchase in the past month; Seagate paid $9.7 million in February for the 150-unit Copper Chase Apartments on the Springs’ southwest side.

City building activity reflects ‘new normal'
GLENWOOD SPRINGS, Colorado — Building activity in Glenwood Springs saw a return to normal, or at least the new, post-recession normal, in 2011.

The number of overall building permits in Carbondale continued a steady climb back up, according to the 2011 year-end report for that town. However, new housing starts continued to be nearly non-existent both in Glenwood Springs and in neighboring Carbondale.

Year starts strong for Eagle County real estate sales
EAGLE COUNTY, Colorado — The local real estate market is usually pretty quiet in January. But numbers from the first month of 2012 show some real strength.

According to the latest information from Land Title Guarantee Co., the number of completed sales in January of this year — 90 — is actually the same as January of 2011. The big difference is the price of those transactions. The total value of all those sales was nearly $104.5 million, the biggest volume number since 2008, and a 21 percent jump from last year's number.

Real estate generates more than $1B in salaries in 17 U.S. markets

There are 333,600 real estate firms in the nation's 843 markets, employing 1.97 million workers.

The sector's average annual salary is $40,300. The top pay levels (in any market with at least 1,000 real estate firms) are $56,600 in Bridgeport-Stamford, Conn., $55,000 in Boston and $54,200 in San Francisco-Oakland.

More than 1,000 new beds coming to CSU
More than 1,000 new beds will be added at Colorado State University over the next 18 months or so and plans are in the works for even more.
That is roughly a 20 percent increase in the number of on-campus beds that will be available for students. New off-campus apartments also are now under construction.
Keeping up with CSU housing needs has proven to be a challenge - and opportunity. Enrollment at the university was approximately 27,000 during the fall semester, up from 24,500 in the preceding semester.