Builders increasing number of row houses from 70 to 500 units

08:22 PM CDT on Saturday, May 14, 2005

By WENDY HUNDLEY / The Dallas Morning News

When it comes to home-building trends in Richardson, small is big.

Builders are turning their attention to smaller townhomes as an alternative to the typical sprawling single-family homes that line suburban streets.

"This townhome thing is hot, hot, hot right now," said Monica Heid, Richardson's development services director.

When projects the city has approved within the last two years are completed, the number of these attached, two- and three-story row houses will grow from 70 units to more than 500.

They have caught on so quickly that officials say the 30-year-old building codes for such housing will have to be updated.

"We're watching the kind of proposals that are coming in," Ms. Heid said. "We're pretty much collecting the changes that need to be done."

The trend is being fueled, in part, by economics.

Because apartments are suffering from low occupancy rates, landowners are selling lots zoned for high-density, multifamily housing, said Jack Murray of Dallas-based housing consultant Residential Strategies.

"Homebuilders have recognized the resurgence of townhome popularity," he said. "It competes well with single-family detached housing. It gives them a niche."

Even so, the number of townhomes is just a blip in the housing market in Richardson, which has almost 27,000 single-family detached homes.

Portrait Homes came to the Dallas area "about five years ago and reintroduced townhomes to this market," Mr. Murray said. "Now there are about 10 competitors."

Woodhaven Townhomes, built in the early 1970s along Townhouse Lane in Richardson's southern sector, was the first such development in the city.

No more proposals for this type of housing were received for the next 30 years, Ms. Heid said.

Two years ago, officials approved plans for Portrait Homes to build Morningstar Meadows, a 110-unit development along North Star Road just north of Renner Road.

The pace has quickened in the last few months. So far this year, the city has approved three plats for townhome developments – II Creeks, Waterford Villas and Lennox Pond.

In addition to economic considerations, the trend is being driven by demographics.

Developers say townhomes are a perfect fit for baby boomers who are reaching retirement age in massive numbers. Many are empty nesters who may not want to be burdened with a big house and yard chores.

The median age in the city inched up from 30.3 in 1980 to 35.8 in 2000, said Ron Smith, a Richardson senior planner. The 2000 U.S. census showed that almost one-fifth of residents were 55 or older.

Almost all of the buyers in the II Creeks development are empty nesters, said Dan Lee, one of the owners of the patio and townhome development on the site of the old Canyon Creek Shopping Center.

"We're not seeing families with children," Mr. Lee said.

At II Creeks, which is under construction, detached patio homes are outselling attached townhomes. Mr. Lee said that's because the company will have four times as many of the zero lot line patio homes.

"Some people want the zero lot line home because there's more privacy," he said. "But there are individuals that want our townhomes because there's more of an urban feel. It's close to neighbors and right on the street."

Townhomes vary widely in price.

At Waterford Villas, being built on Belt Line Road at Grove Road, prices start at $160,000. At the other end is II Creeks, where townhomes range from $250,000 to $300,000.

For older homebuyers, townhomes may have at least one drawback: They'll have to climb stairs in the two- or three-story units.

Some developers are overcoming this obstacle by offering optional elevators.

"Almost everybody is opting for the elevators," Mr. Lee said. "That's definitely a trend."

Developer Mark Humphreys said elevators would also be an option at Lennox Pond, which will become Richardson's largest townhome development. The City Council approved zoning for it last week.

The project will have more than 250 units on an 18-acre lot north of Campbell Road and east of Coit Road.

The development will be twice as big as any other townhome project in the city, but Mr. Humphreys doesn't think he'll have any trouble filling it up.

He told council members last week that he's been briefing nearby homeowner groups on his plans.

At these meetings, he said, residents have asked when the units would be available.

"There has been such a demand," Mr. Humphreys said. "We're looking at adding more luxury items because of the level of the buyer."

New downtown housing is a testament to faith

By Bob Ray Sanders
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

In and around downtown Fort Worth, people are flocking to old and new spaces to set up house.

The new urban-living scene is one I never expected to see, at least not to the extent that it is happening in the central business district.

And yet, just when I thought I could not be surprised by any new development in the downtown area, I got the rewarding shock of my life when I toured a nearby converted warehouse that seems out of place while at same time so obviously in the right place.

At first I'm sure many wondered, "Who would be foolish enough to want to develop housing right in the middle of an area that is home to most of the city's homeless?"

After viewing the Lancaster Lofts, a four-story, 12-unit building across the street from the Union Gospel Mission just east of downtown, the more fitting question becomes, "Who was savvy enough and caring enough to have the vision and the commitment to pull off such a project and prove it could work?"

The answer is Flora Brewer, majority owner of Rhythm Band Instruments, who has taken a keen interest in the near-southeast-side neighborhood where her business is.

Two years ago, she spearheaded a project sponsored by her family's foundation to have a giant mural painted on the company building that homeless individuals walk past day and night. The mural, 365 feet long and 25 feet high, is one of the largest public-art projects in the country.

She also recently provided land in the area for a park to be shared by the homeless and other neighbors.

But to refurbish a 79-year-old building on East Lancaster Avenue and turn it into livable space that some paying customer would want to lease still seemed a bit illogical -- that is, until Brewer did it.

"I've never done anything like this before," said a smiling Brewer as she searched for the right keys to get us into the building.

She had a right to smile.

The historic building, with its high ceilings, wide-openness, large windows and proximity to downtown, proved to be an attractive sale.

By the end of April, the first full month of operation, seven of the 12 units had been rented.

The lofts, 800 to 1,000 square feet, are on the second, third and fourth floors and start at $700 a month. The first floor has been used for an art show and might very well become a permanent gallery.

As we were about to enter the building at 1324 E. Lancaster Ave. one of the tenants, dressed in a blue uniform, was rushing out to his job downtown.

James Doyle is a conductor on Amtrak, and he moved to the Lancaster Lofts from Mesquite.

"I went from being an hour away from work to three minutes away," he said.

One of the primary reasons he chose the building, he said, was security, noting the fence in back, the steel doors on the outside and the all-wood doors to all the units inside.

Two tenants, a photographer and an artist, chose the building for its natural light. There is also a musician with a recording studio and one man who grew up in southeast Fort Worth and then moved to Dallas years ago but wanted to return to his old neighborhood.

All of those tenants chose a building with a great view of parts of the city and, of course, the homeless community that closely surrounds them.

The building, constructed in 1926, was originally a radiator-coring factory and later was home to a moving and transport storage company.

The building was donated to the Union Gospel Mission when property values in the area plummeted after Interstate 30 cut through the old neighborhood.

"Property owners got the mind-set that this was skid row now and the city wasn't going to do anything, so they gave up," Brewer said.

For a long time the mission used the building to distribute clothes and store junk. It was filled from bottom to top with debris when Brewer acquired it.

Brewer's family had given the mission $10,000 in 1996 to repair windows knocked out by the 1995 hailstorm. She would later buy the building for $1 million to start this project.

After talking with a developer and planner in Dallas and being encouraged by Southeast Fort Worth Inc., Brewer believed that it could work.

"Once people get past the homeless issue and see the benefits of the proximity to downtown and the TRE [Trinity Railway Express], they see this is attractive and still affordable," said Glenn Forbes, president of Southeast Fort Worth.

The Lancaster Lofts project is another sign that southeast Fort Worth is ripe for development.

Brewer, by the way, owns another building nearby that she thinks may be a great place for a restaurant.

What do you want to bet that it won't be long before people from downtown Fort Worth will head east to eat on the same street with the homeless?