Condo marketer Bob Rennie billed Woodward’s as an intellectual property, but the 240 units on offer in the rebranded the Village on False Creek – the development formerly known as Millennium Water – are increasingly articles of faith for some people.
Journalists attending the scrum organized to explain Rennie’s new sales strategy for the Village questioned the discounts (an average 30% from pricing in May 2010, and in some cases up to 50%), the implications for the city and whether buyers will want to live in a ghost town.
“I can’t remove your skepticism, and you can’t remove my optimism,” Rennie finally shot back, after about 10 minutes of grilling.
The exchange highlighted the high emotions associated with the project, which the city took control of last year after developer Millennium Development Corp. defaulted on its loan payments. A mix of public scrutiny, civic ambitions and aggressive pricing (first up, now down) have conspired to complicate the project’s marketing. Rennie himself noted that the three appraisal firms advising on the current program faced “a horrendous pricing exercise.”
Despite the important question of just how deep a bath the city will take in Millennium Water, Rennie’s focus is fixed on selling the rechristened Village in a value-oriented market.
“If the taxpayer makes money or loses money on this suite, it doesn’t affect the value when we’re comparing it to other inventory,” Rennie said. “I don’t see a lot of luxury inventory being built; I see a lot of affordability being built.”
And regardless of how the latest sales strategy turns out (Rennie hopes to sell 60 homes in 60 days), one thing is sure – Woodward’s might have been an intellectual property, but selling the Village is taking the business brains and a healthy faith in the development’s future.
Slashing prices on “Vancouver’s last waterfront community,” as Rennie once billed the Olympic Village, changes the game for nearby projects that used to have an edge on pricing.
Renting a portion of the units has helped bring some life to a community many still consider a ghost town (despite ample activity on the surrounding seawall), said Scott Brown, senior vice-president, residential project marketing and sales with Colliers International. Taking the most expensive units off the market was also wise.
Brown questions the impact the latest price reductions will have on other projects, however. Starting prices have fallen to $329,000 today from $450,000 in October 2007.
“What’s that going to mean for Cressey and Pinnacle, who’ve been kind of benefiting from being at $700-plus a square foot and looking like a deal? And now, if [the former] Millennium Water is less than them, they’re stuck – because arguably, Millennium Water is a better location,” Brown said. “They may have shifted the problem to some developers.”
And, if there is a general depreciation in pricing, Brown questions whether other projects will come forward, further slowing the influx of people that will make Southeast False Creek feel like its own neighbourhood.
“It’s just going to be very fascinating to watch what happens there,” he said.
Another fascinating game is being played out south of Vancouver in Delta, where the local council is soliciting feedback from the public this week regarding a potential bid to place Southlands – the former Spetifore farm – back in the province’s agricultural land reserve (ALR).
The 563-acre property was excluded from the ALR in 1981 when Victoria acceded to the request of Delta councillors, and in 1989 it was the focus of the longest public hearing in the history of Canada. Residents then rejected its development, though its central location in Tsawwassen makes it a desirable development site. Opinions on its agricultural capabilities are mixed; it once accommodated a thriving dairy operation, but drainage and irrigation issues make it difficult for most growers.
However, the majority of local residents would like to see it maintain its agricultural designation. Ian Paton, the sole farmer on Delta council, is also in favour of its preservation for agriculture given the loss of more than 1,000 acres of farmland in the community in recent years to the Tsawwassen First Nation treaty settlement and infrastructure development.
This hasn’t dissuaded the current owner, Delta’s Century Group, from spending more than $1 million crafting plans for developing 1,900 residential units as well as agricultural uses on the property.
Century Group president Sean Hodgins said the addition – or restoration – of the property to the ALR would waive municipal authority and bind the hands of future councils.
“It is unprecedented that a local government would make a unilateral move to put land in the ALR without there being some sort of deal, if you will,” he said. “Every inclusion usually has attached with it, from what we understand, some sort of exclusion when the local government is prompting it.”
Residents will have their say in a public hearing March 1 in Tsawwassen.