I had an opportunity to speak with Tom Fleury of Cityline Partners yesterday at the Fairfax County Parks Authority meeting. I noticed on my way to the meeting some new construction materials being delivered to the Garfield Parcel at Scotts Run Station, which last month housed an outdated and vacated office building that saw the wrong end of a demolition crew.
Mr. Fleury confirmed that JLB is moving forward (slightly ahead of their estimate last year) with construction of their two building 445 residential unit mixed use project at 1575 Anderson Road.
The construction schedule shows signs of a resilient market in multi-family which, despite significant new construction during the past 5 years, continues to lag population growth in the Washington DC Metro. Due to zoning constraints within DC much of the pressure remains in secondary markets like Arlington and Tysons. While CityCenter DC was a massive undertaking, and certainly stands out in order of magnitude than anything else happening in DC, but it only included 700 housing units.
Considering the overall regional population growth has been growing by 10s of thousands each year (still anticipated above 40,000 for 2014) one can see why exurban sprawl has continued and why urban population growth has been so slow. No wonder developers and apartment/condominium builders are still finding it economically beneficial to continue to grow the limited housing stock.
There was some lag that occurred in terms of new construction in 2012 after both Ascent by Greystar and Ovation began construction, with many holding out to see what would happen to absorption and market demand. It appears, despite other residential projects also beginning construction, that those with money on the line are still seeing Tysons as a good bet.
Given a ground breaking this month, the new 15-story and 6-story apartment buildings would be on track for leasing early spring 2016. No word yet on when neighbor LCOR’s Commons of McLean (which has thousands of residential units approved through their rezoning) intends to break ground.