Today in Pictures - William O. Lockridge/Bellevue Library

The District of Columbia opened its newest library this week, the Washington Highlands branch William O. Lockridge/Bellevue Library at 115 Atlantic Avenue, SW (that little slice of southwest you didn't know existed on the north edge of Bellevue).  The original library, built on the site in 1959, was demolished in 2009 in favor of a modernist design created by Adjaye Associates.  Jair Lynch was the development manager of the project. The library was designed to earn a LEED Silver certification.

 

Washington D.C. real estate development news

The Gallery of Bethesda Demolition Complete, Excavation Underway

With a $55 million construction loan recently secured, and demolition complete, developers Donohoe Companies and MPM Investments are aggressively moving forward on the Gallery of Bethesda, its 17-story 234-unit residential tower at 4800 Auburn Avenue.

“Donohoe Construction is making great progress on the site," said Jad Donohoe of Donohoe Companies.  "Excavation will finish up in November. The 17-story building will 'top out' in July of next year. And then by early 2014, residents will be moving in. The Gallery of Bethesda is going to bring more life and more activity to this part of Bethesda, and it’s going to prove all over again why Bethesda is one of the best places to live in the Washington region.”

The Gallery will be a quarter-million-square-foot tower featuring a 0.25-acre public plaza, a rooftop pool, and 4.600 s.f. of ground floor retail space.  The project is one of three towers that will make up downtown Bethesda mega-development in Woodmont Central; an additional residential tower is slated to be built at 4850 Rugby, with a six-story office building at 8280 Wisconsin Avenue (possibly breaking ground this summer), completing Donohoe's trifecta, not to mention JBG and Bainbridge, both of which are building 17-story residential projects in the neighborhood.  When all three phases are complete, WDG-designed Woodmont Central will bring nearly 600,000 square feet of residential, office and retail space to downtown Bethesda.

The $55 million construction loan, secured in mid-May, is financed by AXA Equitable Financial Services LLC, and sister company Donohoe Construction is the general contractor.

Bethesda, Maryland real estate development news

Morning Real Estate Review

Bozzuto names new head of construction (Sacramento Bee) The DC area real estate services firm names Chris Block as construction head for Bozzuto Homes, one of its 6 companies.


Penzance, Invesco get $94m loan for Arlington office project (Commercial Property Executive)  The two-building office project near the Clarendon Metro, a project that recently broke ground.

Vornado asset sales could top $1b (Chicago Tribune)  The company, which owns significant property in Washington D.C. and New York, says it could sell off more than a billion dollars in assets.

Foreclosures down for 20th straight month (HousingWire)  Foreclosure filings are down on a year-over-year basis for the 20th straight month.

Contee Co. Redevelops 25 Acres around Prince George's Plaza Metro

As part of the development around the Price George's Plaza Metro station, the Contee Company, LLP, is redeveloping 25 of the its 35 acres, along with Old Town Construction and the Lessard Design. Those 35 acres were originally developed in the early ‘60s. The developer now intends to build several thousand housing units and an office building. Currently, it is working on a building dubbed "Building 6," which will replace 5 recently demolished buildings.

Jared Spahn, a Managing Member of Old Town Construction, said since the area is a living community, Contee is rebuilding the parcels one at a time and demolished the five buildings in February. Spahn said he expects a grading permit for Building 6 "in a week or two."

Building 6 will be a 4-story, 283-unit, 360,000 s.f. garden-style podium building with an underground parking garage, replacing the 105 units demolished.

"It’ll have all the great bells and whistles to compete with all the great projects,” Spahn said.  The bells and whistles apparently include fitness rooms, a business center and meditation gardens to presumably spend time in after spending a long day in the business center. Spahn said it needed to be “extremely high-end to compete with the other great projects that have been invested in around that Metro station.”

Spahn said construction should begin within the next two weeks, as soon as he receives the grading permits.

The  new building will be competing with other “luxury” complexes in the area, but Spahn thinks customer service will set it apart, commenting that having a local owner is what tips it over the edge.

“What I think sets our building apart a little bit from the others is because compared to Post Park and Equity Residential, we are renting from friends and family instead of a multinational corporation. What it allows us to do, we’re not driven by stock prices or market movements because we are long-term investors, it’s going to allow us to provide, we think, a better priced product for our customers than those that have to answer to Wall Street.”

The entire area previously had 555 garden-style apartments in 20 buildings on the site. Through redevelopment, Spahn expects 2,400 to 2,500 units and 350,000 s.f. of office space in the next ten to fifteen years.

Hyattsville, MD real estate development news

The Ground Floor

Big Lots, the close out/overstock retailer, is coming to Edgewood.  Construction is starting shortly on a 37,000 s.f. shell located at 514 Rhode Island, Ave., NE.

The fish market on the corner of 14th and P St, NW closed two weeks ago.  No details yet on what will replace the decrepit relic on the prominent Logan Circle corner.

Wagamama, the highly anticipated British ramen restaurant, is moving forward with their build out in Penn Quarter.  The estimated start date is late July 2012.

The Protein Bar, a healthy food and catering restaurant, is coming to JBG's development at 800 N. Glebe Rd.  Construction is slated to start in late July.

Bar Louie, the stadium-sized bar at Gallery Place, is opening their first MD location in Rockville Town Center.  The grand opening will be celebrated June 18-24th.



Update:  Big Lots is coming to Edgewood, not Brookland.


Jen Angotti is a DCRE agent licensed in DC and VA.  She also writes Concrete Jungle DC, a blog about real estate and design.

Morning Real Estate Review

Capitol Hill Suites completes first phase of renovation (Wall Street Journal)  The $3.7m renovation of the hotel, now known as Capitol Hill Hotel, is the first of two phases that will complete early next year.

National Building Museum to build mini golf course (CBS news) The museum worked with architects and developers to design just the right place to tee off.

Is it time to stop building convention centers? (Atlantic Cities) As convention attendance falls, building new centers only increases competition between cities and causes cities to undercut each other.

Home prices rising slightly, but March sales were at record lows (Lender Processing Services) Real estate technology firm says March home sales were the lowest since the mid '90's.


Commercial / multi-family loans up 0.3% (Mortgage Bankers Assn) 3 of the 4 major multi-family investor increased their holdings in the first quarter.

Today in Pictures - Rosslyn's Sedona & Slate

JBG Companies has begun skinning its Rosslyn residential projects Sedona and Slate.  The two-building apartment project began construction in January of 2011, and JBG expects the project will be completed by the first quarter of next year. Clark Construction is building the project designed by Architects Collaborative. Both apartment buildings are expected to be LEED Silver Certified.

Arlington, Virginia real estate development news