October 1, 2012

Legacy Town Square joins crowd of new apartments in Redmond

Image courtesy of Tiscareno Associates [enlarge]

Legacy Town Square is one of four apartment projects being developed in downtown Redmond.

Legacy Partners Residential will start construction next spring on a 177-unit apartment building at 160th Avenue Northeast and Northeast 83rd Street in downtown Redmond.

Legacy Town Square will have five floors of wood-frame construction over a concrete podium containing 2,000 square feet of retail space and five live-work units. Parking for 194 cars will be at grade and below, and two banks of elevators will be at opposite ends of the building.

James Geimer, owner of J Realty in Seattle and Legacy's project manager, said strong job growth and a wave of new apartments are both driving demand for housing in downtown Redmond.

Three major apartment projects in downtown Redmond opened in 2009 and 2010: River Park, 319 units developed by Legacy and later sold to Equity Residential; Veloce, 300 units developed by Trammell Crow Residential; and Red 160, with 250 units developed by Equity Residential. All are within three blocks of the Legacy Town Square site.

Geimer said demand has been strong at the three new complexes, and their occupancy rates are above 90 percent.

Three other projects started construction last summer and will add 450 units. Geimer said that demonstrates the market's strength and the desire for young professionals to live in downtown Redmond.

Units in Legacy Town Square will range from 615 to 1,200 square feet, but most will be 775 square foot with one bedroom. Geimer said they will have luxury finishes and eight will be two-story penthouses with a master bedroom on the top floor. Residents can rent private ski lockers or use a bike storage room with a workshop.

Geimer said rents at Legacy Town Square will be competitive with the new neighbors. About 10 percent of the units will be affordable.

Rents at Red 160 start at $1,280 a month for studios, $1,370 for one-bedrooms and $1,930 for two-bedrooms.

Architect Bob Tiscareno called Legacy Town Square's winged roofs a “signature look” for the downtown core. One of the building's focal points will be its street frontage and pedestrian amenities, according to Tiscareno.

It will have a widened mid-block crossing that will become part of the city's mid-block path program, which is creating a pedestrian corridor through downtown. The site is close to City Hall, the transit center, QFC, Trader Joe's and the Burke-Gilman Trail. It covers 1.17 acres that had been vacant.

Tiscareno said the project is designed around a second-level courtyard for residents that will connect to interior common spaces. He said they are working on design and construction documents, so plans are in flux.

Geimer said the courtyard will have a canopy so it can be used all year, as well as an outdoor kitchen, fire pits and barbecues. There could be a spa or fitness center that opens to the courtyard.

The 250,000-square-foot building's exterior will be metal panels and CeraClad fiber cement siding above a base of concrete, glass and stone. Interior finishes are still under design.

Tiscareno said the team will seek LEED silver certification.

Construction is scheduled to start in May 2013 and take 14 to 16 months to complete.

The team is Tiscareno Associates, architect; Express Construction, general contractor; Yu & Trochalakis, structural engineer; Coughlin Porter Lundeen, civil engineer; and Thomas Rengstorf & Associates, landscape architect.

The project received a determination of non-significance last week from the city of Redmond. Appeals of the decision can be sent to the city until Oct. 26.

Geimer said he thinks the local apartment market will stay strong.

“As evidenced by all of the recently announced projects and a lack of starts in the last three years, the greater Seattle area is a very desirable place for multifamily investment relative to other markets around the country,” he said. “We think the newer projects, such as Legacy Town Square in Redmond, will offer a much better value by providing slightly larger units and lower rents than those in downtown Seattle.”

Legacy Partners Residential is based in Foster City, Calif., with an office on Mercer Island.