The Real Estate Cycle: Now For a Word from The Folks Who Live at the Preston Center Apartments, Preston at Northwest Highway
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The folks who live at the Preston Center Apartments, 8502 Preston Road at Northwest Highway, at the northeast intersection with the big Texas star, are a little concerned about where they will move if the Transwestern deal goes through. They are at the tip of the primo 3 acres where the developer plans to scrape and build new units, which are now proposed to be six stories graduating down to three with underground parking.
Which is only natural. Which is also the natural course of real estate as properties and neighborhoods change, and values increase.
We like it when our property values increase. We feel rich. Talking to Charles Dilbeck’s grandson, he was telling me how he is shopping for a place in Brooklyn and how buildings that were affordable there a few years back are now selling for millions. Same story in most major U.S. cities. Last year, the median home sales price in the United States shot up 11.5 percent year-over-year, with homes staying on the market for an average of 35 days. Dallas real estate is among the hottest in the country.
So if you own some dirt, this might be a great time to sell. I spoke with the owner of these units, Toledo Tex LLC, who told me he was approached by the broker, LaSalle, AFTER they had talked to the owners of Townhouse Row. Frankly, he says, I want to sell because of the economy. Collectively, his units are appraised by DCAD at about $823,200 or $34,300 each. When I asked what he had been offered, he said, a fair price. If the sale does not go through, he will likely have to raise rents. He has worked to clean up the property over the past few years, but knows it’s not Class A Preston Hollow material.
“In the long haul, my properties and Town House Row should be replaced with something that fits in with neighborhood,” he said.
This area is a developer’s dream. The Preston Center Apartments (formerly called Park Embassy Condominiums) are located in one of the best real estate universes in the country, jammed in between Preston Hollow and University Park. The 24 rental units were recently remodeled by the owner, who acquired them gradually over the years, unit by unit, beginning in 1985. The apartments are each about 620 square feet with one bedroom, one bath, a washer and dryer, dishwasher and microwave, all supplied by the landlord. The rent covers the water. There is a swimming pool. There are no longer crappy, dilapidated cars in the parking lot, the drug dealers are gone.
Those rents: $860 to $920 a month. That’s like $1.45 ish a square foot, cheap for Dallas rents. Uptown is now asking $2.50 per square foot and getting. It’s even cheaper than the rents at the new mini warehouse down at Northwest Highway and Hillcrest Road on a square foot basis. Are they noisy? You bet. Northwest Highway is no longer a country road.
But the location cannot be beat. $860 to $920 a month, and you can be off on Northwest Highway, this city’s primary east-west artery, in minutes north, south, east or west. One of the greatest benefits of this community is it’s walkability. When my own mother lived “Behind the Pink Wall”, she walked to Preston Center and even to her hairdresser at Preston Tower.
On the other hand, some residents do tell me they hate the traffic in the area, but the fact is, Dallas is growing and expanding. One agent tells me that out of every three clients he has, two are moving here from out of state.
Where will we put them? Where will these people go to find safe, close-in digs for $1.45 a square foot. Good question — The Village? North or west?
Maybe the answer is to tear out Northwest Highway…
I wonder if Northwest Highway is so busy because Mockingbird, the other east-west artery, was narrowed to one lane a few years back …
And speed bumps on Meadow. Which the homeowners on Northwood and Del Norte might want to ask for.
[…] Per Candy Evans “Dallas real estate is among the hottest in the country”. Are you ready to Sell? […]
Informative article. Wonder if someday, 200 years from now, they will be planning a 200-story building on this site? Growth and change are inevitable, as long as populations increase.
Of course that's part of the problem. The nutty soccer moms who live in Hermés & Jimmy Chooland didn't want a tunnel 150' feet under the ground on Mockingbird as a thru way connector to I-35 from Central. These Luddite Kooks thought CO & CO2 from vehicles was going to permeate up through solid rock & melt their 'Special' kids brains or cause an earthquake.
Dallas is growing, just like NYC, and Chicago, and other American cities did in the early 20th c. and the population is gettign denser – it's what helps makes a city truly world class.
With the DART Rail, and the Hi-rises being built in the inner city, its bringing us closer to a truly great city
But Dallas is dependant of the automobile and that probably ownt change.
It is time that Dallas consider a tunnel under either Mockingbird, Northwest Highway ( my vote), Walnut Hill, and / or Royal. Gte the thru traffic and business traffic ( like trucks) off the streets.
I agree with Ms. England, that the traffic on NWHwy was exasperated by the reconstrcution of Mockingbird.
Dallas, the greater, is being held hostage by the realtive few who live in the Park Cities.
Yes, it will be expensive in the front end, but if tolled, it will eventually be paid for – and we NEED IT.
As to the proposed development at the corner of NWHwy and Preston, it is what it is.
Where was the outcry when the Preston and the Athena Towers were built? What about the hirise in Preston Center?