Priciest condo tower yet coming downtown

Nat Bosa, developer of a string of pricey downtown condo towers, has greenlighted his next and most expensive project: a $1 million-a-unit development just south of the Santa Fe Depot.

Upon completion it would be valued at more than $400 million if sales projections hold up.

“We’re mobilizing and getting ready to start construction,” the Vancouver, B.C.-based head of Bosa Development said in an interview Monday.

The news came to light as he was completing the purchase of the former Driver office building on Cedar Street. He offered an update on what is tentatively called Pacific & Broadway. He said he originally hoped to start at mid-year but lengthy permit approvals have pushed groundbreaking into the next few weeks.

“It feels comfortable to go ahead and we’ll see where it goes,” he said. “It’ll be an expensive project. People are going to have to believe they are getting true value. It’s definitely not cookie cutter.”

The project marks a major financial milestone in that Bosa expects the average unit to sell for about $1.75 million. Even the smallest units at the currently projected rate of $1,060 per square foot would sell for just over $1 million.

Bosa said such condos go for even more in Vancouver, Seattle and San Francisco, partly due to interest from mainland Chinese buyers who are looking for places to park their wealth. They represent 10 to 12 percent of buyers in those cities, he said.

“I think we’ll get some interest but nowhere near that high,” he said. “Our market is mainly people from California. They want to sell their home and move down and some want a great unit. It’s a great location that’s going to maintain its value.”

The 450-foot-tall project, located at the southeast corner of two Broadway gateway streets, will include 232 units ranging from 956 to 2,083 square feet in 41 stories. There will be 16,027 square feet of ground floor retail space, possibly for a signature restaurant. Completion is expected by mid-2017. A permanent name is to be selected after a marketing contest planned next year.

“A great city deserves a great tower with a distinctive character,” said the architectural narrative by the legendary firm, KPF, Kohn Pedersen Fox that is designing the project. “San Diego is a beautiful city with a long stretch of ocean front. Inspired by the dynamic forms of waves and the graceful geometry of seashells, two embracing curves define the unique oval-shaped tower with two open ends.”

It’s one of the last building sites left from the original holdings of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, now part of BNSF, that were spun off to a subsidiary in the 1980s, later renamed Catellus.

Bosa said one of the reasons he thought the building will be received well is because of recent improvements along what’s called San Diego’s bayside “front porch.”

• The Headquarters at Seaport District, just north of Seaport Village, opened last year in the city’s former police station after more than 25 years of planning and false starts.
• The county government completed its $50 million waterfront park at the County Administration Center, turning asphalt parking lots into gardens, playgrounds and interactive fountains.
• The city and port completed the first phase of the North Embaracero Visionary Plan between B Street and Navy Fields, a major beautification and enlargement of the Embarcadero. The port also opened a new cruise terminal on Broadway Pier.
• Two adjoining hotels are under construction at the Lane Field parking lots, where the Padres once played as a minor league team until 1958.
• Redevelopment of the 1920s Navy Broadway Complex, in the planning for more than 30 years, could proceed if legal issues are cleared away. UT Publisher “Papa” Doug Manchester holds the land lease from the Navy to build a hotel-office-retail project on the 16 acres south of Lane Field between Broadway and G Street.

“So a lot of the ‘front door’ (to the city) is being cleaned up and that now basically allows developers to go to work,” Bosa said. “Face it, San Diego is a great place to be.”

Civic San Diego, the city’s development arm, approved the project in 2012, but Bosa said at the time he was holding off a construction start while San Diego’s battered housing market recovered.

Today, there are virtually no new condo units left for sale downtown and resales are rising in appreciation. CoreLogic DataQuick reported 45 resale condos at a median price of $490,000 in November, up 10.6 percent from a year ago. Overall condo resales countywide were up 4.9 percent to $320,000 over the same period.

Brad Richter, CivicSD assistant vice president for planning, said Bosa’s is the only new major condo project proceeding downtown, since other developers have decided to build apartments instead.

Kris Michell, president of the Downtown San Diego Partnership business group, called Bosa’s project “beautiful and iconic.”

“It’s really cutting-edge design,” she said. “In fact it is going to be so beautiful and iconic that I really think it will truly be a world-class building on our waterfront.”

Bosa said he also is planning to move forward on a second condo project north of the depot at the southwest corner Kettner Boulevard and Ash Street, another of the Catellus properties. It is planned for 285 units in 36 stories.

“We expect to go ahead with that for sure next year,” he said, “I hope.”