While Lennar’s $1.7 billion loan from the China Development Bank for the development of San Francisco’s Treasure Island and Hunters Point Shipyard has fallen through, Lennar plans to break ground on 88 residential units at Hunters Point this summer.
“We are continuing to move forward with development of Hunters Point Shipyard and are expecting to start home construction this summer. At the same time, lenders continue to have significant interest in financing the Shipyard and Treasure Island, which they believe are extremely attractive projects.”
In addition to the 88 units this summer, Lennar plans to begin construction on another 159 residential units this fall according to the San Francisco Business Times.
The approved redevelopment plan for Hunters Point includes 10,500 residential units along with 3.5 million square feet of retail, office, and research & development uses and over 300 acres of park and recreation areas.
So what happens if Lennar can’t or is unwilling to come up with the money? Can they hold the area hostage until someone gives them a pile of money to give up their claim?
This will end up being a piecemeal development that in the end won’t create any real neighborhood.
another 10,800 minus 200 units to go!
I don’t know about that Mark. Some of the most interesting and vibrant neighborhoods organically evolved over time from hundreds of small developments. On the other hand there are some fantastically sterile big master planned developments.
@MOD: I agree (just look at Mission Bay), but in this case my gut is telling me it’s going to be a very long time before this area gets filled in. 200 residential units are a nice start, but commercial amenities have to be close behind to create something close to a neighborhood.
Bigger question is whether Lennar is going to hold the undeveloped property hostage until it secures financing.
Don’t get your hopes up too high on Lennar’s ability or willingness to develop even 200 homes this summer. I’ll believe it when I see it.
The SF Business Times stated that this is at least the third time over the years that Lennar has announced these identical plans, only to have those plans shelved.
You cry wolf a few times, and then you lose all credibility.
If Lennar is happy to let this valuable real estate stagnate until they can extract maximum value from it, perhaps the city should consider taking the property and selling it to someone who will actually develop it. Before anyone calls me a socialist, I would ask what you would want to happen if there was a vacant, weed-strewn lot in your neighborhood that had been dragging down property values for years, what solution you would accept then.
This is a radical idea, but why can’t the City just divide the area into a grid, zone/plan it, and sell plots of land to private parties? That’s exactly what created the character of SF.
I guess it’s moot, because it will never happen… but development by a single corporation, on a massive scale, at best results in Irvine, CA., and in general is a recipe for shady political deals and a less-than-optimal end result.
Does Lennar have some kind of permanent claim in exchange for the environmental cleanup?
I don’t think Lennar owns Hunter’s Point in the first place, so it’s hardly a socialist idea to sell it to someone else instead.
well, of course they could do that, but over and above necessary environmental remediation issues (if any) that flat wouldn’t be addressed by piecemeal development due to economic constraints, the city would have to start the planning process over again.
If I recall correctly, what we are seeing with the current Hunters Point Shipyard
Redevelopment Plan is the result of a lot of negotiating between the Mayor, The Board of Supervisors, the Redevelopment Agency (R.I.P.) and the developer. In June 2008, city voters approved Proposition G (again, if I have the parcel(s) right; Lennar already had a development in the works for another section of the shipyard)::
Selling plots of land to private parties might avoid the “shady political deals”, but it would also prevent the necessary and desirable deals that can only be brought about as a result of economies of scale.
Of course, pro-gentrification forces would dispute that building affordable housing or multi-family public housing is desirable. The recent Board of Supervisors would seem to disagree.
Also, one of the key goals was to make the development pay for itself, and selling individual parcels is known to be a losing proposition in a post-Prop. 13 reality where low density development never generates the tax revenue necessary to pay for the city services required by new residents and commercial tenants and soon becomes a net drain on the city’s general fund.
As a Bayview resident, i have had a watchful eye on the development of the shipyards and the projections of development for the last 6 years.
Lennar as a developer has definitely dragged their feet as far as putting a shovel in the ground beyond infrastructure construction. I assumed back in 2008 it was because of the housing market bust and obvious poor investment return projections, which was understandable, but since then it seems the delays have been less driven by watching market conditions, but watching other developments along the 3rd Street corridor. It would seem a concerted effort to stand firm as surrounding areas in decent proximity become more appealing to those who could not tell you where the shipyards are or have never been to this part of SF, given their hesitancy to push forward with an aggressive construction pace. Even at Treasure Island they had only committed to building the first of three phases of the projected development and I get the sense their commitment to the shipyard development is structured the same (with an eye on distinct points at walking away), meanwhile they seem to be sitting back watching the development of Dogpatch/ Central Waterfront, even the HopeSF Developments, as their potential selling points over developing and still needing to further develop commercial and retail and waiting on City extension of transportation options.
It was about the time of the start of many of those other projects and developments that Lennar stopped their quarterly neighborhood flyers with updates and construction projections, so while i believe they may break ground on the 88 units (this time), I wouldn’t count on seeing the start of the additional 159 until a target occupancy percentage is reached for the first development, regardless if they land a new deal for Chinese funding.