 Don't Look for New Home Building in Flagstaff Soon At the peak of the home sales market in Flagstaff building permits and new residential developments where overwhelming our Flagstaff’s City Planning Department. In 2006, 675 permits were issued for construction of new single-family homes, townhomes, condos, and multi-family (apartment) units. By 2007, as the housing market started its plunge, building permits within the City of Flagstaff dropped to 175. In 2008, the total number of home building permits in Flagstaff was only 80. Flagstaff housing construction permits issued in 2009 will show more total housing permits issued, but most are for apartment dwellings. 309 units of apartment dwelling permits had been issued by Flagstaff’s building department as of the end of October, but only 2 single-family home permits and 2 townhome permits were issued in the first 10 months of the year. Today’s Flagstaff's newspaper reviewed the status of a variety of Flagstaff residential and commercial developments.
As is obvious to those who drive, walk, or bike over Cedar Hill, Cavan Opportunity Fund has been actively pursuing development of the 111 acres it owns atop McMillan Mesa by installing roads and infrastructure that will ultimately become new Flagstaff homes and office buildings. By installing this infrastructure now, Cavan is positioning itself to have an ideal central location for new Flagstaff homes once the housing market improves.
Other developments remain mostly on the drawing boards in spite of initial planning stretching back nearly 5 years. Presido in the Pines was to be a walkable residential/commercial development on the far west side of Flagstaff. Presidio is now in bankruptcy with lot owners unable to build because infrastructure remains incomplete. Another mixed-use community, the Aspen Place at Sawmill in central Flagstaff, has slowed the retail phase of development that is underway and there is no sign of the planned housing development yet. Juniper Point, a planned 1600-home community between the Aspen Place at Sawmill Project and the Pine Canyon Golf Community, has not even completed construction of its website and is now telling the Daily Sun that its project will not begin construction until 2011. Empire Residential (the California-based developer responsible for the 1999-2006 development of the Ponderosa Trails subdivision) stumbled into bankruptcy because of over-development in Phoenix and California, leaving half-built shells in its Pinnacle Pines Flagstaff townhouse development. The proposal to build 3600 homes between Ft. Tuthill and University Heights, known as Villagio, collapsed when the cost of traffic management at free-way entrances became obvious. Fewer homes on larger lots may someday be built in that area.
The upshot of all of this is: Don’t look for new homes to buy in Flagstaff for the next several years. Unlike other areas, Flagstaff has only a few vacant shells of half-built homes and few unsold, unoccupied new homes for sale. Still, with nearly 9-months’ supply of resale homes on the market in Flagstaff, homebuilders generally are not going to be adding to the inventory by building new homes for several years to come. You will find a few opportunities to buy a new home -- especially a new townhome -- in existing developments around town. And, there is always the potential to buy your own lot and custom-build. The issues and costs involved with that choice raise many other questions and this post is already too long to cover them. If you're set on living in a brand-new home in Flagstaff, give me a call and we'll work to get what you want!
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To buy or sell any Flagstaff home, contact me: Ann Heitland at RE/MAX Peak Properties.
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