Dorchester Carruth Holds Grand Opening Party

March 8, 2008 By

The Ashmont MBTA station and surrounding area is home to significant development and redevelopment these days, included in this is the mixed-use, for-sale and rental development at the Carruth, which overlooks the transit hub.

The Carruth, a Trinity Financial development, now has a model home open, and have priced their 1 through 2+ bedroom units from $269,000 to $429,000 (including parking). We received a tour of the construction site in late 2007 (see The Carruth Condo Development), and it’s great to see a transit oriented development, just south of the city, take shape.

A grand opening house party will be held Saturday and Sunday, March 8th and 9th, from 12 – 4PM each day. This will serve as our Featured Open House of the week. Please let Larry, and the whole team at the Carruth, know that you heard about the open house here on the Boston Condo Blog. Food and drinks (coffee) will be served at the event in conjunction with two of the commercial inhabitants of the building, Tavolo, and Flat Black Coffee.

Dorchester Carruth Condos Under Construction

Filed Under: Boston Open Houses Tagged With: ,

Further Price Changes at Claflin Building

March 8, 2008 By

The residences at 20 Beacon Street, otherwise known as the Claflin Building, saw further prices changes after last week’s $500,000 reduction (see $500K Price Reduction on Claflin Penthouse), which coincidentally, turned into a $600K reduction.

The remaining units at the Claflin all received price reductions, from $100K to $200K. Price per square foot in units now run between $820 to $1,089.

  • 20 Beacon Street U:3 with 2,310 square feet, new price: $1,895,000
  • 20 Beacon Street U:4 with 2,343 square feet, new price: $2,074,000
  • 20 Beacon Street U:5 with 2,343 square feet, new price: $2,195,000
  • 20 Beacon Street U:PH with 3,672 square feet, new price: $4,000,000

For more information, or to setup a showing, please contact us using the link at the top of this page.

Filed Under: Beacon Hill Condos Tagged With: , , ,

Developers Promise Columbus Center Completion

March 5, 2008 By

The Boston Globe recently reported that the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority board has secured a $270 million guarantee from the developers of the Columbus Center project that they will see the expensive four-block deck over the highway to completion.

The guarantee clears another hurdle for the project, which has been 11 years in planning and development, encountered monumental opposition, and finally went into construction only late last year.

Columbus Center is a significant mixed-use six-building development that will be built on top of a deck that stretches over open traffic lanes on the Massachusetts Turnpike from Clarendon to Tremont Streets in Boston’s South End.

An interesting point that the article in the Globe mentions is that the deck will be owned by the Turnpike. The Turnpike Authority amended its air-rights lease with the developers, Winn Development and MacFarlane Urban Realty Co., to clarify the ownership and purpose of the deck on which the mixed-use project is being built on the edge of the Back Bay.

That clarification – stating the deck will be owned by the Turnpike, leased to the developers, and created in part to benefit the public – was necessary for the developers to use $10 million in jobs-creation grants from the state.

Crews have been onsite in the South End for some time now, working nearby other developments, including 285 Columbus Lofts and the Clarendon Back Bay.

Filed Under: South End Condos Tagged With:

Penmark South End Condo Update

March 4, 2008 By

We received a request to provide an update on the Penmark South End condo development in Boston’s South End. Located on Father Gilday Street, parallel and south of Washington Street, the Penmark is a 60-unit well appointed development that has been laboring to close out the final developer units from the 2005 redevelopment of the building. We blogged about what were the 11 units for sale back in mid November (see Penmark South End Condo Prices), and now there are 7 remaining units on the Boston MLS.

Various floor plans are still available in the $566 to $740 per square foot (+/-) range. Available units are listed from $565,000 to $1,055,000, and do include garage parking.

For more details on available units: Penmark South End Condo Listings (2.7 MB PDF)

Filed Under: South End Condos Tagged With: , ,

Harborview Auction Postponed…Again

March 3, 2008 By

A quick update on the Charlestown Harborview at the Navy Yard condominium development. As we reported in 2007, the condo development went from for sale condos to being announced as a rental development, then came the spin that the entire development (building, land, etc.) would be sold via auction, then the lawsuits began, and now we’ve seen two delays in the actual auction.

The auction that was scheduled for November 8, 2007 was postponed until February 1, 2008, and was rescheduled for March 1, 2008, however, according to Pesco (who is handling the sale), the sale did not go forward on this date.

We receive a stream of requests every day regarding Harborview, anywhere from how much rent will be, to when can I buy a condo.  At this point, everything is at a stand still.  It’s obviously a mystery as to why the current owner is “sitting on” an essentially completed property that could be recouping investment.  Stay tuned for more information.

Filed Under: Charlestown Condos Tagged With:

$500K Price Reduction on Claflin Penthouse

March 2, 2008 By

We’ve run several stories on the famed Beacon Hill Claflin Building (for the most recent, see Featured Open House at 20 Beacon (Claflin) and Beacon Hill Claflin Building Gets New Prices), and the multi-million dollar penthouse unit, on the market now for a total of 540 days according to the Boston MLS has just underwent a price reduction of $500,000, taking it from $4.6 million down to $4.1 million. At press time, prices on the other 3 units in the development remained unchanged.

A three-bedroom, three-bathroom trophy residence, the Claflin’s 3,672 square foot penthouse (priced at $1,116 per square foot) at 20 Beacon Street is worth your consideration if you are in the market for a very high-end luxury downtown home – a stone’s throw from the new City Hall and Boston Common, a Beacon Hill masterpiece revitalized for the 21st century.

Filed Under: Beacon Hill Condos Tagged With: , , ,

The 1850 Lofts Host Open House

March 1, 2008 By

On March 1st and 2nd from 11AM to 3PM, the 1850 is holding its first sneak preview opening to the public. 2 model units have been furnished with bedroom and living spaces and are handsomely decorated by Terrat Elms, one of the South End’s award winning design firms. Take a stroll over, or park in the lot behind The 1850. A hostess will meet you in the lobby and take you up to the new sales office for a tour.

Typically our Featured Open House listing runs on Sunday mornings, but with the 1850 doing a two day gala, we’re running our listing early this week. Let the hostess know that you heard about the open house on the Boston Real Estate Observer when stopping in. The 1850 Lofts – for more information, including a map to get you there.

For Buyer Agency representation on any condo in Boston, please contact us.

Filed Under: Boston Open Houses Tagged With: , , ,

No Real Estate Crisis in Boston

February 28, 2008 By

Bostonians are bombarded with talk of a “real estate downturn”, the buzz around town is that Buyers want to take advantage of the real estate crisis, sometimes we hear that prices are falling, and foreclosures are being touted as a widespread epidemic.

However, in the core of downtown Boston:

  • There’s no real estate downturn
  • Boston city center real estate is not in the middle of a real estate crisis
  • Prices are not falling, but appreciating, in downtown Boston
  • There are little to no foreclosures in downtown Boston

What do we mean by “downtown Boston”? Simply put, it’s the neighborhoods that make up the core of the city: Back Bay, South End, Beacon Hill, West End, North End, Waterfront, Financial District, Midtown, Leather District, northern South Boston, and the Seaport District. Oftentimes, generalizations are made about what “Boston” actually encompasses, and Boston is inaccurately lumped into state-level Massachusetts information, skewing the public’s perception of the real story.

Does it matter that distinctions are made between downtown Boston, the suburbs, the state of Massachusetts, and the US, when talking about the status of the real estate market? On many levels, yes. Sellers need to know that they can still sell and make a profit, Buyers need to know that they are still going to have to pay a premium for living in the city center, and everyone needs to know that the downtown Boston real estate market is much more stable than the majority of news stories would have you believe.

Kevin Ahearn puts together yearly statistics for downtown Boston real estate, representing a broader scale of neighborhoods than we alluded to above, and he displays a 5.74% appreciation in average Boston condo prices in 2007 over 2006. Additionally, to take a specific South End neighborhood example, we see both average and median home prices continuing to rise. The city center is much different than the rest of the state, or the country for that matter, and these statistics demonstrate that.

Across the USA, foreclosures are indeed up in numbers, however, there is by no means an epidemic of foreclosures in the city of Boston. Take, for instance, a recent foreclosure map that John Keith put together that provided a visual representation of where foreclosures are cropping up in Boston. One might think that there are tens of foreclosures all across the city. There was 1 foreclosure in downtown Boston at the time of this writing, at 25 Channel Center. A single foreclosure is far from an epidemic.

We aren’t trying to put a “positive Realtor spin” on these messages. Truth be told, there are many towns, cities, and even states that are experiencing falling prices, and significant foreclosure numbers. However, mass generalizations that liken downtown Boston to the state of Massachusetts, or the country for that matter, paint an inaccurate picture. More accuracy and attention to detail needs to be practiced when citing real estate statistics – real estate is local. Bottom line, according to the data available, downtown Boston real estate is doing just fine.

Filed Under: Boston

Europeans Buy Boston Real Estate

February 26, 2008 By

We have been working with more and more Europeans over the past six months, all of whom are interested in purchasing downtown Boston real estate, not because the core of downtown Boston is in a real estate crisis (see No Real Estate Crisis in Boston), but because their “dollar” (i.e. Euro) is going a lot farther than it ever has in the past.

In essence, since the launch of the pan European currency, called the Euro, we have seen a complete flip flop in its value. One Euro went from being worth less than 70 US cents in 1999, to now, almost 1.5 US dollars. The euro (currency sign: €; banking code: EUR) is the official currency of the European Union (EU), and has been implemented in 15 member states, known collectively as the Eurozone (Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain). Yes, the UK still uses the Pound, but the trend there is the same; as demonstrated in the chart below, the Euro continues to appreciate against the dollar (i.e. one Euro is now worth almost $1.50, and has been moving up since 2003).

currency-chart

The one economic mantra that you are more than likely familiar with is buy low, sell high. The Europeans are contacting us because, at this point in time, they have the ability to buy low. For Bostonians, and those here in the US, prices aren’t “low” (and in real terms, prices continue to rise in the core of the city, more to come on this soon), however, for Europeans, who currently enjoy the fruits of a currency trend whereby their Euro now buys more dollars, prices are low, and they are seizing this opportunity.

We talk with a growing number of Europeans each week who are interested in buying Boston investment property, or a Boston vacation home in one of America’s most historic cities. Europeans recognize that downtown Boston real estate will always hold its value, and the best time to “get in” is when their currency allows them to do so at a discount.

Filed Under: Boston Condos

Columbus Avenue Boston Open House

February 24, 2008 By

If you want to be close to the action of the soon-to-be very high end Bryant on Columbus and 285 Columbus Lofts, the penthouse at 290 Columbus Avenue may be a good fit for you. Located across the street from the two luxury developments, 290 Columbus Avenue is our Featured Open House of the week.

The unit has been on the market for quite some time, but with renovations recently completed, this unit shines nicely. Listed at $599,000, the unit boasts 916 sq. ft. ($653.93/sq. ft.), a private roof deck, and central air (come on, we can at least dream of the warm temperatures to come in a few months).

The open house will take place on Sunday, February 24, 2008 from 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM. To discuss writing an offer on this home, or any other that you see while out today, please contact us.

290-columbus-avenue-2 290-columbus-avenue-1

Filed Under: Boston Open Houses Tagged With: ,
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