Tag: real estate

Tacoma Rising

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I lived in Seattle for almost 10 years. I moved to Tacoma for the affordability and what I noticed was a much cleaner downtown Tacoma. It’s also much safer than ever. When I was a kid growing up in Lacey, Olympia, and Tumwater, Tacoma was on the news all the time for all the wrong reasons. Today, we’re in the news for all the right reasons! But don’t just take my word for it, check out this article by South Sound Business:

“I think the same is happening in the (Tacoma) Dome District” and elsewhere in town, like the Proctor and Stadium districts, he said. There’s available real estate — old warehouses, for example, that can be better used and that have significant character, he added, noting the city’s willingness to rehab them, as has occurred in the Brewery District, rather than demolish everything for new towers.”

By South Sound Business

Tacoma building 20-unit residential apartment building without notifying neighbors

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By Candy, Mike and Todd Show
November 11, 2019

It might be a bit jarring to own a house in a residential neighborhood and only find out through the news that a few houses down an apartment building is being constructed.

That’s what happened in one Tacoma area where a house is being replaced with a building set to house 20 400-square-foot units renting at $1,050 a month, and which will only have one parking space for the entire building, reports The News Tribune.

“It’s got one parking spot. So let’s see, you’ve got probably 40 people living there. Divide that by two and carry that over and then so you have got one spot for 40 people,” KIRO Radio’s Todd Herman joked.

Sufficed to say neighbors were a tad thrown off by this project, especially since they hadn’t been notified about it, according to The News Tribune. The project does align with standards for transit-oriented developed projects which have reduced requirements for on parking in such units.

Because this particular project and others like it in Tacoma has 20 or fewer units, it is exempt from any form of standard environmental review, public review and comment, and even public notice, which is why residents didn’t know about it until they heard about the developers’ property tax credit getting approved by city council.

“When these buildings get approved, it always drives me crazy that there when they don’t include parking. Just because I think of the impact on the rest of the neighborhood and everyone else,” added co-host Candy Harper. When Candy built a tree house in her yard, she even managed to notify neighbors.

For Todd, it’s not about city regulations or zoning, it’s about being a good neighbor.

“Tacoma just started building this stuff. They didn’t so much as knock on the door and say, ‘Hey, we’d like to build a 20 units apartment building of studio apartments with one parking spot next to you.’” he said. “I’m saying this: If you live in a building with no parking spots, you don’t get to have a car … Or you have to prove that you have parking for your car.”

From https://mynorthwest.com/1592690/tacoma-apartment-house-neighbors/

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