Post #341: Recession

The recent dips in the stock market got me asking how the next recession might affect the Town of Vienna, including property values and tax revenues.  This is my first look at how Vienna compared to the U.S. during the last recession.  The question I am eventually working toward how the Town of Vienna revenues changed during and following the last recession.

In 2008, the US very nearly suffered a collapse of its financial system.  And as time passes, we tend to for get that.  Because, in the end, the various Federal rescue efforts — and deposit insurance — were successful.  For now, at least, we still have a banking system, and housing prices have large recovered.

The first section briefly reviews the national impact of the 2008 financial collapse, the second section looks specifically at DC and Vienna housing prices.  Continue reading Post #341: Recession

Post #340: Choices for the Town’s election process

This brief posting points out two simple changes the Town of Vienna could make to ensure greater election transparency and greater voter participation.   The Town Council could vote to have the Virginia Campaign Finance Disclosure Act (CDFA) apply to Town of Vienna elections.  And it could vote to move Town elections to coincide with the November general election.

Continue reading Post #340: Choices for the Town’s election process

Post #339: More on Maple Avenue valuations and investment

One oddity of Maple Avenue retail property is that  little of it is advertised as being for sale.  That’s an oddity, if you think there is some sort of crisis in retail.  But not if you think that returns on current investments appear reasonably good.  If the returns are adequate, sales should be infrequent, if only to take advantage of the tax-deferred nature of the investment: Capital gains taxes only have to be paid upon sale of the property.

In any case, my internet search turned up only three advertisements for Maple Avenue retail property for sale.

As noted in Post #319, the combined Starbucks drive-through and Just Tires properties are being offered for sale at $961 per retail square foot.  (See this reference for the ad.)  From that ad, you can infer something like a $60/sq ft/year rental on the retail space.

The two medical office buildings at Maple and Center (where the Sunrise assisted living was proposed):  $7.5M, $682/retail square foot, at this link.

The Princess Jewelers shop, 527 Maple Avenue West, $1.7M, calculated as just over $500/square foot, at this link.

And that led me to thinking about what is and isn’t a feasible investment under existing C1 zoning.

And here, I’m not thinking of just rehabbing existing space.  We know that buildings along Maple are being rehabbed and repurposed all the time.  So that level of investment clearly appears profitable.  A few recent examples finished or in the works include:

  • Taco Bell –> Starbucks;
  • Magruders –> restaurants;
  • Dead gas station –> gas station plus convenience store;
  • Coldwell Banker offices –>  Wawa
  • Pro Feed Pet Supplies –> Ramen restaurant
  • Sandy Spring Bank –> Animal hospital

I could go on.  The point is, there is no lack of examples for redoing existing space.  (And this doesn’t even count the cosmetic make-overs of various shopping center fronts up and down Maple.)

But a more serious question is, how profitable might new construction be?  We have seen some new construction (Sweet Leaf, 2010) in living memory.  But not much.  Is that because it’s sufficiently profitable to remake existing buildings, or is that because it’s just not profitable to build something new, along Maple, under existing zoning?

Obviously, I’m not a builder.  But let me try a rough cut at a pro-forma calculation.

Continue reading Post #339: More on Maple Avenue valuations and investment

Post #338: Rental electric scooters, again.

This article is about decisions that the Town must make, in the near future, regarding rental electric scooters and rental bicycles.  It ends with some discussion of the presumed environmental benefits of electric scooters.

Bottom line:  Thanks to a change in Virginia law, the Town needs to come up with some form of regulation for “dockless” rental electric scooters by 1/1/2020.  If not, we end up with open season for rental electric scooters in Vienna, which we probably want to avoid.  Unregulated dockless bike and scooter rentals have become a nuisance in many major cities (see examples in this post).

Here, I line out what a minimum set of regulations probably ought to cover.  (Which is no great shakes — just look at what other local jurisdictions have done.)

Separately, the Town needs to find places for racks for the “docked” Capital Bikeshare rental bikes.

N.B:  In “docked” systems, bikes (or other devices) are picked up from and returned to dedicated racks.  (If not, steep charges mount up for the renter.)  Smartphone apps show how many bicycles/scooters are available for use at each rack.  By contrast, in “dockless” systems, scooters or bikes may be picked up and left anywhere, tracked by a combination of on-board GPS and internet connectivity.  Smartphone apps show the location of available scooters or bikes.   Rental is accomplished via smartphone app and account, or in some cases, via credit card swipe.

Continue reading Post #338: Rental electric scooters, again.

Post #337: Retail property assessments along Maple

I’m certainly tired of hearing about what a crisis Maple Avenue retail is in.  At the risk of caricature, the argument seems to be that We Must Act Now or risk having Maple become a ghost town.

Anyone who has tried to drive down Maple Avenue on a Saturday afternoon probably wishes for a little more”ghost town” now and then.  By eye, the reality appears to be the opposite of crisis:  Maple appears to be a busy, viable, profitable shopping district.  Maybe a little too busy at times.

In this posting, I’m going to take my prior analyses of Maple Avenue retail a bit further and look at tax assessments along Maple, compared their trend and level ($/sq ft.) to assessments of similar properties outside of Vienna, but nearby.  The bottom line is consistent with all my prior work:  Tax assessments of the largest retail properties here are rising, and assessment per square foot of land is comparable to retail sites near (but not in) the Town of Vienna.

People who tell you there’s a crisis in Maple Avenue retail do not appear to have the facts on their side. Continue reading Post #337: Retail property assessments along Maple

Post #334: 8/2/2019 meeting of the BAR re Marco Polo/Vienna Market

The Board of Architectural Review (BAR) met at 8 this morning (8/2/2019) to review the plans for the Marco Polo/Vienna Market development.  The materials for that meeting may be found at this location.  My recording of the session can be found at this Google Drive link (download 2019-08-02 ….).  There were large stretches of the meeting where the microphones were not used, so some portions may be too faint to hear.

The key points are that 1) there was no material change in how this building would look and function and 2) the BAR will almost certainly provide final approval for this.  The next meeting of the BAR is Thursday 8/15/2019. Continue reading Post #334: 8/2/2019 meeting of the BAR re Marco Polo/Vienna Market

Post #333: How did 901 Glyndon happen?

You can see the background on 901 Glyndon in this posting.  It’s a building with two floors of condos over one floor of retail space.

Put aside the fact that it is jarringly out-of-place in a neighhorhood of single-family homes.  My question is, how did this get built under standard Vienna commercial (C1) zoning?  Doesn’t that zoning require that more than half of the building be used for commercial purposes? 

Continue reading Post #333: How did 901 Glyndon happen?

Post #332: UPDATED 8/1/2019: Why I loathe social media/why the Russkis are winning, in one short lesson

This is a set of screen captures from a dialogue that, unfortunately, I entered into last night, on some Facebook page related to Vienna development.  Some entries may be duplicated as I maintained continuity of the screen capture.  Please Google “Neal Rentle” and “Vienna” and see what you come up with.

Just some observations.  If you see someone a) who just joined a group a few hours ago, b) who posts under a name that looks real, but is in fact a false name, who c) refuses to offer any verification that they are in fact a Vienna resident, and d) gets obvious points of fact about Vienna completely wrong, and most tellingly, e) immediately deflects to another point when called out on those incorrect points of fact (a form of the “Gish Gallop“), then f) odds are you are looking at a paid “social media campaign” posting.  Or, possibly, a sock puppet.

Apparently this sort of thing is now part of the game plan.   Do your due diligence, folks, because there really are agents out there, both foreign and domestic.   Caveat emptor. Continue reading Post #332: UPDATED 8/1/2019: Why I loathe social media/why the Russkis are winning, in one short lesson