Gemdale Gets $113M Loan for Seattle High-Rise Project

0
578

Skyglass Tower rendering. Image courtesy of Cushman and Wakefield

Gemdale USA Corp. has secured a $ 113 million home loan for the Skyglass Tower, a multi-family high-rise project in Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood. Cushman & Wakefield arranged the debt through AIG.

The total cost of the 29-story tower is estimated at $ 196 million, according to the developer’s website. Hewitt Architects is the project architect and the property is scheduled for delivery in the second half of 2023.

The Skyglass Tower will be 0.4 acres on Dexter Ave. Take N. 222. The development plans include 338 apartments, 2,260 square meters of retail space on the ground floor and a wide range of amenities.

The location is across from Denny Park, 1 mile north of downtown Seattle. The area is home to Amazon’s sprawling urban campus and Facebook’s Dexter offices. The neighborhood is in great demand with multi-family developers and investors alike – Blackstone recently paid more than $ 300 million for two properties half a mile northeast.

Ready to ricochet

Seattle has taken a slow recovery path after battling the economic headwinds of 2020. The metro lost 92,300 jobs over the year that ended in May, down 6.8 percent. Still, the unemployment rate fell to 4.9 percent in May, 90 basis points lower than the national rate, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

While teleworking was not uncommon among technology-minded employers in Seattle even before the pandemic, reopening office space is expected to have a positive impact on commercial and multi-family markets. In April, Facebook, one of the largest employers in the region, was well on its way to reopening its offices with a 10 percent occupancy rate, the Puget Sound Business Journal reported.

In July, Multi-Housing News spoke to two executives from TWG Development about the latest changes in the Seattle development scene, as well as the impact of big tech companies like Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon on affordable housing on the subway.