By Jon Peterson
Seattle-based Briarbox has paid $3.7 million to buy an apartment development site in the lower Queen Anne/Uptown submarket in Seattle located at 1512 to 1566 5th Avenue West.
Chris Gurdjian, founder of Briarbox, did not respond to several phone calls seeking comment for this story.
The seller of the property was a local family trust. It sold the asset through the services of Dan Swanson, a vice president with Kidder Mathews in its Seattle office.
“This site is going to be expanded significantly by the new ownership. The complex now is a 20-unit property. Through a mid-level up-zoning the property in the future could be expanded to somewhere in the range of 60 to 80 units,” says Swanson.
The property right now is only occupied in 13 of the units. “The reason for this is that there was a major storm last year that affected the other 7 units, and that part of the property is not being occupied at this time,” said Swanson.
It will take some time before this project gets approval on the up-zoning. This could take somewhere in the ballpark of up to 18 months.
The Queen Anne apartment market in Seattle remains very tight. The current vacancy in the sub-market is in the three percent range.
The timing of the new development project could attract some employees who will be working at the planned new campus for Expedia. “The apartment project is located close to the new Expedia office campus that could be developed by 2018 and would attract some employees as renters to the project,” said Swanson.
Photo courtesy of Tam’s Treasure Box
