These Smaller Boston Apartments Come with Big Amenities
Say you want a ton of amenities with your newer Boston condo or apartment; and yet you only have about $2,800 a month or $895,000total to spend (poor you). What do you do? You rent or buy one of the smaller units in these recent Hub developments. The relatively cheaper price tags may mean living quarters of well under 500 square feet, but they also mean basketball courts, pet-grooming, electric car charging, rooftop pools, fire pits and (of course) yoga. Let's start in the South End.
Troy Boston is part of the constructionpalooza transforming the northeastern corner of the South End. Its 378 apartments include 3-BRs, but they also include studios of barely 300 feet. The one coolly rendered above runs to 323 square feet. Renting that puppy entitles the tenant to the building's full slate of amenities, including the pool, the cabana, the rooftop fire (and barbecue) pits, the yoga room, the fitness center. And so forth.
An Igloo with WiFi Among Hub's Tiniest Rental Treasures
At the New Ink Block, Even the Men's Room Is Worth Seeing
Here's the latest installment of Bates By the Numbers, a weekly feature by Boston real estate agent David Bates that drills down into the Hub's housing market to uncover those trends and people you would not otherwise notice. Follow him on Twitter and check out his ebook, Context: Nine Key Condo Markets, 2.0.
[Minimalist, European-style kitchen in One Ink; photo by David Bates]
In 2006, National Development bought the six-acre South End lot housing the Boston Herald headquarters. The newspaper rented the space back for the next five years. Between the Herald's exit in 2011 and the groundbreaking of the Ink Block in spring 2013, the movie The Heat starring Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy was shot on the property. And, a few weeks ago, Whole Foods and two of the Ink Block's three apartment buildings opened. Recently, Ted Tye of National Development, the developer behind the Ink Block, spent a few moments with me discussing this key Hub project that has more than 300 apartments and nearly 200 parking spaces.
After you purchased the property, how was your first development meeting with the neighbors?
I think I went into my first meeting and said, 'We want to look like the South End.' And people usually like that, but they didn't like that. They said, 'You know what, we want you to be a little bit iconic here, we want you to be an agent of change, so do something that looks really special.' That's kind of where we started.
I think I went into my first meeting and said, 'We want to look like the South End.' And people usually like that, but they didn't like that. They said, 'You know what, we want you to be a little bit iconic here, we want you to be an agent of change, so do something that looks really special.' That's kind of where we started.
How did that impact your development plan?
There were a lot of iterations until we came up with what we were going to actually do. We were thinking early on more high-rise. We went through a quiet period, 2008 to 2010, when no one was building anything. And we talked to people in the South End and they said, 'All we want is a full-service grocery store.' And trying to take this transitional neighborhood and trying to make it into something different, I felt like a grocery store could be the perfect anchor.
There were a lot of iterations until we came up with what we were going to actually do. We were thinking early on more high-rise. We went through a quiet period, 2008 to 2010, when no one was building anything. And we talked to people in the South End and they said, 'All we want is a full-service grocery store.' And trying to take this transitional neighborhood and trying to make it into something different, I felt like a grocery store could be the perfect anchor.
Mapping the Tiniest Boston Homes on the Market Right Now
There are nine homes for sale right now in Boston under 800 square feet. The biggest of the lot is 750 square feet and the smallest is 456. Price-wise, not surprisingly, none rise above $500,000 (though that doesn't mean they won't go for over that). All tout their locations as major selling points, again not surprisingly. And all give hope to the hopeless when it comes to shopping for condos in this Thunderdome of a housing market. That is, these tiny nine are decent places priced to move. You just have to get creative once you move in.
Debut of 26 West Broadway; Rents at South End's Ink Block
SOUTH BOSTON—The six-story, 31-unit 26 West Broadway is open for business. The apartment complex is offering 16 different floorplansand has a snazzy new website to boot. [Curbed Boston]
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SOUTH END—Here's a quick check of the rents at everyone's favorite newspaper-HQ-turned-transformative-apartment-complex: "Rents in the [Ink Block] range from $2,529 to $2,804 for studios, $3,234 to $4,304 for one bedrooms, $4,104 to $4,704 for two bedrooms and $5,404-$5,804 for three bedrooms. Garage parking costs $325 a month." [Herald]
Open House Weekend Tour: Oh So Artsy in SoWa
Like the makings of any up-and-coming and trendy neighborhood, the area south of Washington Street was branded "SoWa." This area of the South End has been an enclave to artists and creative types before it was cool to be artsy. While loft-style condos are rare, a few of them can be found in SoWa. At very trendy prices, ranging from $830K to $530K, one of these homes would be a perfect space to reach your creative potential.
What You Get for $2,500 a Month in Boston's South End
There are currently five apartments officially up for grabs for $2,500 a month in the always-enviable South End of Boston. How far does that sizable stash go? It looks like it at least gets you more than a studio, though less than three bedrooms. Mostly, it appears to rent you location. Let's take a deeper dive, though. Our first apartment is the 2-BR, 1-BA, 683-square-foot Unit 1 at 41 Haven Street. It comes with W/D.
It's a new spin on the Hub's traditional church conversions: "In a first-of-its-kind deal for the church in Boston, the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in the South End has signed a 99-year lease with a developer on a parking lot the cathedral owns at Harrison and Malden streets. The developer is transforming the parcel into a sleek 160-unit rental apartment building with ground floor retail space." [Globe]Ink Block, Sepia Boston Deals; Big-Time Dot Development
SOUTH END—The rental component of the Ink Block mega-project is 25 percent leased so far (above is a new shot of one of the model units) and the condo component of said mega-project, Sepia Boston, is 90 percent sold. [Curbed Boston]
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DORCHESTER—Big doings proposed for 10 acres adjacent to the South Bay Center, "including 115,000 square feet of commercial and retail space, a 65,000-square-foot cinema, a 150- 200-room hotel, up to 500 units of multifamily housing and two parking garages." [Biz Journal]
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14 Photos of Boston's South End From Back in the Day
With all the talk lately of just how much the South End has changed(and is changing), we thought we'd stroll down memory lane with the help of the City of Boston's photographic archives. This reel of South End highlights covers the early 1950s through the mid-1970s, a time when the neighborhood was undergoing a sweeping wave of forced urban renewal. The "Mr. Logue" referred to in the photo above, for instance, is Edward Logue, the development administrator of the Boston Redevelopment Authority for much of the 1960s. We've captioned some of the spots in these shots.
New People, Developments Lead to 'Hyper-Inflated' South End
Here's the latest installment of Bates By the Numbers, a weekly feature by Boston real estate agent David Bates that drills down into the Hub's housing market to uncover those trends and people you would not otherwise notice. Follow him on Twitter and check out his ebook, Context: Nine Key Condo Markets, 2.0.
[Rendering of the under-construction Ink Block]
Ted Pietras has been a South End broker and resident for 34 years. He is actively involved in the community and his passion for the South End is clear. Recently, we spent a few minutes discussing this key Hub market.
What do you think makes the South End different?
It's probably more heterogeneous than most other neighborhoods, both in nationalities and income. There is a lot of the diversity that is here and that is going to be here for a long time and everybody lives together. Not that everybody is best buddies. But it makes for a very diverse community. It has its appeal. It's appealed to me for 34 years.
It's probably more heterogeneous than most other neighborhoods, both in nationalities and income. There is a lot of the diversity that is here and that is going to be here for a long time and everybody lives together. Not that everybody is best buddies. But it makes for a very diverse community. It has its appeal. It's appealed to me for 34 years.
Boston's First AC Hotel by Marriott Will Open Next to This
The clue in our latest Real Estate Jeopardy was this: The developer of this ginormous Boston complex is planning to open a 200-room AC Hotel by Marriott right next to it.
Six Figures Over for Duplex in South End-Back Bay Borderlands
It's the Hub real estate trend that won't die (well, it and all that babble about micro-apartments): over-asks. Homes across the region continue to sell for above their asking prices—sometimes for well above. Just check out the penthouse duplex at 246 West Newton Streetin the Back Bay-South End borderlands. The 3-BR, 2.5-BA, with deeded parking and its own private roof deck, dropped on the market in late September for $1,599,000.
First Details on the Hotel Opening Next to South End's Ink Block
National Development, the concern behind the South End's game-change-y Ink Block (including its Sepia Boston condos), is out with news re: the hotel it intends to construct adjacent to said mega-project. The developer has also spirited over the above rendering courtesy of Elkus Manfredi, the always-busy architects designing the new inn.
Where Are the New Boston Condos? Openings Scarce in '15
A week and a half ago we mapped the many major apartment-building openings scheduled for Boston in 2015, led by the 398-unit AVA Theater District. We then set about building a map of all the major condo-building openings scheduled for Boston in 2015. And you what? We found exactly one.
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