By Jack Stubbs
Late last week, a large swath of vacant land in Pierce County, which is slated for development, changed hands.
On Friday, March 16th, 138 parcels of undeveloped land located in Edgewood, just north of Puyallup, sold for $21.7 million, or approximately $157,246 per parcel, according to public records filed with the city of Snohomish. The buyer of the vacant land was Richmond American Homes, a Denver, Colorado-based company that builds single-family homes. The seller of the property was Conner Homes at Westridge LLC, an entity affiliated with Bellevue-based Conner Homes, a company that builds residential homes throughout the Pacific Northwest.
In public records, the vacant land is designated as “land and improvements.” A property listing on the buyer’s web site, “Westridge,” shares the same address as the recently-acquired parcels, and Richmond American Homes has development plans in the works for the vacant land, according to Alan Boeker, chief operating officer of Conner Homes.
“Richmond has acquired two model home permits; they’re going to set up a temporary sales office in a trailer [there] over the next couple of weeks,” Boeker said. “The lots are all finished and ready for homes, and they’ve spent a lot of time with the city getting their plans approved, so I expect a lot of activity from them soon.”
The property, located at 2988 83rd Ave. Court E., is two miles to the north of Puyallup and roughly four miles to the West of Sumner. Additionally, the property is less than half a mile from Washington State Route 167 and roughly three miles from access to Washington State Route 512.
Founded in 1977, Richmond American Homes and its subsidiaries have built more than 195,000 homes nationwide since the company’s inception, according to its web site. Richmond American homes has properties in California, Florida, Oregon, Arizona and Virginia, among other locations.
All told, the company operates 17 communities throughout the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan area, according to its web site. Some of these include the Amber Meadows Estates in Puyallup; the Campus Fairways in Lacey; Haven at Harbor Hill in Gig Harbor; and Sunrise at Mill Valley in Bothell. The company currently owns five apartment communities in Puyallup, which is approximately two miles of the south of Edgewood.
Founded in 1959, Conner Homes has built nearly 6,000 homes—including single-family homes, condominiums and apartments—in the Northwest, according to the company’s web site. The company currently manages eight apartment communities in the Puget Sound region, some of which include Sunridge at Elk Run in Maple Valley, the Ten Trails apartment community in Black Diamond; and Perkins Prairie in Buckley.
There have been several other transactions involving vacant undeveloped land in the Puget Sound region in recent months. On January 3rd, Austin, Texas-based Forestar Group Inc., a residential and mixed-use development company, acquired 19 parcels of vacant land in Lake Stevens for $14.4 million. In late January, 5 parcels of vacant land in Mountlake Terrace totaling 15 acres were acquired by Woodinville, Washington-based Sierra Construction Company Inc. for $13 million.
More recently, on February 16th, North Carolina-based Hancock Forest Management sold 56 parcels of vacant forest land near Eatonville for $73 million to Beutler Exchange Group LLC based in Lake Oswego, Oregon.
