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After years of little new development along Fort Collins' major gateways, planned apartment complexes are starting to pop up along I-25.
Las Vegas-developer CVRT has proposed 330 apartments on the southwest corner of Strauss Cabin and Harmony Road, just west of Interstate 25. It joins a similar project at the Prospect Road interchange, which is slated for 650 apartments, townhomes and single-family homes.
Harmony 23 sits on 23 acres, a near perfect triangle bordered by Harmony Road on the north, Strauss Cabin Road on the east and the Fossil Creek Inlet Ditch on the west. Multifamily development is pushing out to the interstate because of land availability and a mobile population that commutes among Northern Colorado's cities and towns, said Eric Holsapple, principal with LC Real Estate Group in Loveland.
"People work in one city and (live) in another ... and I-25 is the Main Street of Northern Colorado," he said, quoting Larry Kendall, founder of The Group Real Estate.
With land and water costs pushing Fort Collins home prices near $400,000, and a construction defects law hampering condo construction — often a lower-cost option for home ownership — many residents are still renting, Holsapple said.
Christopher Johnson, assistant director of the Everitt Real Estate Center at Colorado State University, said "a lot of people think of students when they think about apartments, but something like that near such a transportation avenue when you have a market that is functioning like ours might be going after an older group that would be buying but is now renting."
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CVRT officials did not return requests for comment.
The site is in the city's employment zone, which required the developer to get a zoning modification to allow the site to be 100 percent residential rather than complementary to employment.
Harmony 23 is adjacent to about 236 acres being developed by longtime Fort Collins developer JD Padilla of Post Modern Development. Combined, the two projects would develop the entire southwest corner of Harmony Road from Interstate 25 to Strauss Cabin Road.
Padilla's project is largely retail and commercial, including a convenience shopping center in the first phase.
The final two phases of Padilla's project will likely include a hotel and 120,000-square-foot indoor sports complex that he would like to see supported by a sporting goods store, the only "big box" store slated for the property.
DEVELOPMENT
305 upscale apartments planned in north Fort Collins
If Harmony 23, Padilla's project and Gateway at Prospect all get built, they will transform the city's two most underdeveloped gateways within the next few years.
Despite a plethora of apartment projects in the works throughout the city, Fort Collins' rental vacancy rate remains less than 3 percent, according to the second quarter Colorado Multifamily Housing Vacancy and Rental Survey conducted for the Colorado Division of Housing.
Photo Courtesy VF Ripley Design
Twenty-one community members have been chosen to participate in the Leadership Loveland program for 2016-17, the Loveland Chamber of Commerce announced this week.
The program allows participants to learn about local businesses and institutions.
"The Leadership Loveland program continues to define excellence and evolve Loveland's community by bringing together strong future leaders in an environment that fosters growth, collaboration and vision," said Mindy McCloughan, CEO and president of the Loveland Chamber of Commerce, in a press release.
The class includes: Matthew Barber, Bank of Colorado; Christine Berlage, New York Life; Allison Bohling, city of Loveland; Matthew Canaga, Larimer County Coroner's Office;Carmen Cisneros, Kaiser Permanente; David Crowder, McWhinney; Rico Devlin, LC Real Estate Group; Blas Estrada, The Group Inc.; Keli Estrada, Mueller & Associates; Rollin Goering, LC Real Estate Group; and Heather Gruwell, Weedin Agency. Also included are: Milo "Buddy" Hovland, Great Western Bank; Wendy Lowe, P2 Solutions; Juilian Lucero, Aspen House; Shane McWatters, Primerica; Shelley Polansky, Better Business Bureau; Matthew Putman, UCHealth; Tracie Reeves-Hartman, Fresh Plate Catering; Kayla Roofe, Fyn Public Relations; Keller Taylor, Budweiser Events Center; and Tim Zimmerman, Thompson Valley EMS.
The LC Real Estate Group team consists of talented people with over 80 combined years of experience in real estate brokerage, development, property management, marketing, financial analysis, and administration. The team is committed to improving the quality of life in Northern Colorado, where its members live, work, and raise their families.
In 2016, the name was changed to represent the firm’s broader role as an integrated real estate company. With Partners and Brokers Eric Holsapple, Blaine Rappé, Nathan Klein, Wayne Lewis, Nick Galluzzo, and Rollin Goering along with an experienced support staff, a variety of real estate aspects are provided. “LC Real Estate Group is able to perform all the functions of the real estate transaction from project introduction to the day of closing,” Klein says. He explains that a strategic plan is tailored for each project, placing an emphasis on a high level of personal contact with users, investors, developers and brokers at the local and regional levels. “Through our proprietary database of properties, tenants, brokers, and investors, we are able to have highly targeted direct marketing campaigns that focus on finding the most qualified users or investors for any property.”
LC Real Estate Group Aspects
Commercial Development
“With both Thompson Valley Towne Center, North College Marketplace, we started from scratch,” Klein says. “We bought the land, got it entitled and built the buildings. That’s just one example.” LC Real Estate Group has also taken over the Safeway complex on Mulberry and College in Fort Collins and has renovated and re-tenanted. Additionally, a property in Lakewood on the corner of Jewell and Wadsworth is currently in the works. “We bought out the Albertsons lease and right-sized the area for Rite Aid according to their specifications,” Klein says. “We have a lease with ARC Thrift Store and a land lease with Auto Zone.” It’s again an example of taking an under-utilized center and making it more appropriate for the neighborhood needs.
Investment and Management
On several occasions, property has been purchased and improved. “We often found these properties to be under-utilized and so, when we bought them, we would renovate, re-tenant, and work to increase the value.” Their new office is a prime example. LC Real Estate Group purchased the 28,000 square foot property at 1712 Topaz Drive near U.S. Highway 34 and Boise Avenue in December of 2014. After renovation, LC Real Estate Group moved its 21 employees and partners into the west end of the building, inhabiting 4,000 square feet of the complex. It has since contracted with other tenants to complete the plan.
LC Home
This arm of LC Real Estate Group provides two different options. The first will be to provide the engineering, entitlement with the involved city and the horizontal (roads and utilities) construction and then offer the lots for development. Klein references the Ridge at Mariana Butte project which offers rare infill development at the world renowned Marianna Butte Golf Course. These will be development ready lots. The second option would also include the vertical (the houses) construction as appropriate.
Brokerage
“What sets us apart here is that we come to brokerage with significant experience in commercial real estate, investment and development, and residential areas,” Klein says. The LC Real Estate Group team has such a broad expanse of experience that helps them help their client regardless of the project or need. “We can hold our client’s hand through the entitlement process and on through. It’s not so much transaction centered but more client centered.” And, with the new structural organization, there’s more flexibility. “With the rebranding we have empowered our residential sales people from LC Homes to do third party residential property sales.” Previously they sold homes built by LC Homes and referred other listings to an outside realtor. “Now we can handle both sides of that. We can handle the sale of our property and, if the client is selling their current home to move into ours, we can also handle that.”
The bottom line for LC Real Estate Group’s new position is having the ability to work with the client on whatever the need might be; commercial or residential. “We have so much more flexibility and the opportunity to service the whole client is huge. It’s very exciting.”
Project Qualifications
LC Real Estate Group possesses nontypical experience in a number of areas that make it uniquely qualified to assist in the sale of certain listings and development projects.
Economic Development
The principals have extensive experience working with ED professionals and understanding complex economic development strategies. Founder Don Marostica served as the Director of Economic Development and International Trade for Colorado until January 2011; Eric Holsapple has a Ph. D in Economics and served as Chair of the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corporation (NCEDC) in 2007. He was selected to serve on the Board of CSU’s Regional Economics Institute in 2011. Nathan Klein is actively involved with the Loveland Chamber of Commerce and was chairman of the board in 2013. Rollin Goering joined the Chamber Board in 2016.
Political Experience
LC Real Estate Group has unmatched experience working with legislature, state, national and local entities to promote bills, or secure funding for projects including the use of Urban Renewal Areas and Tax Increment Financing. Its team has worked on dozens of projects with city staff and maintain continuous working relationships with them.
University Experience
LC Real Estate Group has extensive experience working with universities in many arenas including teaching, research and founding, directing and helping to secure funding for the Everitt Real Estate Center at CSU. As Chair of the NCEDC, Holsapple negotiated an agreement that brought a regional economist to CSU. LC Real Estate Group remains active in the Everitt Real Estate Center and maintains a booth to expose company listings at each of the regional real estate events.
Negotiation Expertise
With more than 80 years of combined development and brokerage experience, partners and brokers have negotiated deals with companies ranging from IBM to Mobile Oil to King Soopers/Kroger and totaling several hundred transactions with a transaction value totaling several hundred million dollars.
Financial Expertise
The company prides itself on being one of the most analytical financial experts in the business. Its team has multiple degrees in economics, finance, real estate, and accounting and understands the unique aspects of what it takes to make a deal feasible. LC Real Estate Group’s experience with public/private partnerships and unique financing mechanisms forms a unique background for financing large projects.
JOHNSTOWN — Robert Pfankuch of Fort Collins has acquired 2.9 acres of vacant land in the 2534 mixed-use development in Johnstown, where he will build a self-storage facility.
Pfankuch Storage 2534 LLP paid $503,000 to the Thompson Ranch Development Co. for the land at 4560 Venture Drive as developers have been busy announcing deals bringing a variety of businesses to 2534.
Pfankuch could not be reached Thursday for details on the project. Pfankuch owns Parkview Self Storage in Greeley and Johnstown Self Storage in Berthoud.
Steve Griffith, broker and principal at Griffith Realty Advisors in Fort Collins, represented the buyer, and Nathan Klein of LC Real Estate Group in Loveland represented Thompson Ranch Development Co.
2534 is a 600-acre mixed-use development that has been gaining momentum in recent months. Last week, it was announced that Swire Coca-Cola USA purchased 11.2 acres in the 2534, where it plans to construct a 125,000-square-foot beverage distribution center. High Country Beverage recently acquired land for a similar facility that is next door to the property Swire purchased.
The development also will have a 250,000-square-foot Scheels sporting goods complex, a 254-unit luxury apartment complex by AG Spanos Cos., Liberty Fire Arms and single-family homes at Thompson Crossing, all under construction.
By Craig Young, Reporter Herald Staff Writer
LOVELAND -- The open spaces in north Loveland's Longview-Midway business development continue to fill in, with plans for Taco Bell and Verizon stores the latest to move forward.
Cellular Plus, a premium retailer for Verizon, recently bought a lot northwest of U.S. 287 and 65th Street, north of the Wal-Mart parking lot.
The Billings, Mont.-based company, which owns 57 Verizon stores including one at 1420 W. Eisenhower Blvd. in Loveland, plans to build a 2,000-square-foot store at the site, according to marketing director Merisa Saunders.
The company is still finalizing permits with the city of Loveland, Saunders said, but hopes to start construction soon and finish by the end of the summer.
The store at 151 W. 65th St. will employ about 10 people, be open seven days a week and sell Verizon cellphone services and a wide variety of products.
"We have all the Verizon products," Saunders said. "Samsung and Apple products ... cellphones and tablets, cases, accessories, power cords, portable power, car chargers, mobile Wi-Fi that we call Jetpacks, signal boosters, wireless speakers."
Loveland's LC Real Estate Group, which is developing the three-lot minor subdivision at 65th and U.S. 287 (Garfield Avenue), is working on closing the sale of the lot just south of Verizon, according to Nathan Klein, a partner with LC Real Estate.
Alvarado Concepts of Denver, a major franchisee of Taco Bell, plans to build a 1,900-square-foot restaurant with a drive-thru window on the corner of Garfield and 65th, according to executive vice president Jeff Geller.
He said by email that he hopes to close on the three-fourths-acre property in the next month, start construction in late July, pending building permits, and have the restaurant open in September.
The third lot, which is still for sale, has city approval for a 10,000-square-foot multitenant building, Klein said. The one-acre parcel sits between BioLife Plasma Services and the Taco Bell and Verizon sites.
Klein said his company could build on the lot and lease out the space.
"We may or may not build that," he said.
The developer recently hauled some fill dirt to the site, visible from Garfield Avenue, in anticipation of construction, Klein said.
Other projects in the area include the Esh's Discount Groceries store opening soon at 375 W. 71st St., a proposed King Soopers Marketplace store, gas station and other retail just south of Esh's, the Mountain Pacific business park in the works southeast of 71st and Garfield and more housing under construction in the Wintergreen subdivisions west and south of Wal-Mart.
Craig Young: 970-635-3634, cyoung@reporter-herald.com, www.twitter.com/CraigYoungRH.
LC Real Estate Group may have started small but, in 20 years, it has blossomed into an impressive operation. It began when Don Marostica and Eric Holsapple connected over common interests. “I took a sabbatical after I received my PhD in economics from CSU,” Holsapple says. “I met Don, moved into his conference room and went to work. I started helping out with financing on a few projects and we hit it off.”
Deciding to partner officially, they purchased Moore Commercial, and changed the name to Loveland Commercial LLC, creating a real estate development and brokerage company. The vision was to improve the quality of development in Northern Colorado. Blaine Rappé joined them the next year.
Over time, Holsapple says, three segments evolved. “We were doing mostly established development and then added brokerage. The investment and management piece began in 1999 with Thompson Valley Center. It was our first big commercial investment. We were doing mostly what I call horizontal development. We put in the roads and streets and sold lots to developers.”
Nathan Klein joined them in 2004 as a CSU intern and, shortly after graduation, began full time work. “In 2005, Nathan began his work and grew the brokerage business by five times what we used to do,” Holsapple says.
But times changed and so did the company’s focus. “In 2006 and 2007, building basically stopped and builders reorganized. We still had 150 lots and no one interested in building on them.
So, in 2008, we created Midtown Homes and began with Boise Village North,” he explains. Since then, this arm of the company has built a variety of houses, including significant entry-level and affordable neighborhoods such as Pine Tree Village.
The winds of change once again shifted and the partners were faced with a new direction. In 2009, they were called upon to develop North College Marketplace in Fort Collins. More opportunities developed and the company’s efforts expanded. In fact, over the past two decades, the firm has had an impressive impact. It has completed two King Soopers shopping centers (one in Loveland and one in Fort Collins), developed more than 2,500 residential lots and built almost 500 homes, including ongoing projects in Tulip Creek in east Loveland, Spring Creek in Fort Collins and Fox Run in Greeley. In addition, it has expanded its investments and developments into the Denver area and Colorado Springs.
The partners of Loveland Commercial LLC began to look at the broader view of what they had to offer. “We are clearly a regional player in the marketplace,” Holsapple says. “And we realized that we needed to match our image to the reality of our work.”
The firm’s name was changed to LC Real Estate Group LLC to lead to better recognition and acknowledge all the components of the business. Midtown Homes, for example, is now LC Home and part of the same company.
“With different names for the residential and commercial divisions, they appeared to be different companies,” Klein says. “But, now, on every company vehicle and/ or commercial and residential project or listing, the LC Real Estate logo will appear. Not to mention we are now positioned to take care of the entirety of a client’s real estate needs, regardless of whether that is commercial or residential in nature.”
Earlier this year, the firm moved into 4,000 square feet of a 28,000-square-foot building it owns at 1712 Topaz Drive near U.S. Highway 34 and Boise Avenue. After remodeling the interior, LC Real Estate Group moved its 21 employees and partners into the west end of the building in early March.
Loveland Commercial, LCC, is celebrating its 20th anniversary by changing its name and moving offices.
The company, started by Eric Holsapple and Don Marostica in 1996, has expanded the depth and breadth of its services, which led the firm to rebrand itself as LC Real Estate Group, LLC.
The name change will increase awareness that Loveland Commercial and Midtown Homes — the residential construction company founded by Loveland Commercial partners — are part of the same company, said Nathan Klein, partner and commercial brokerage manager.
"We are certainly not just Loveland, and not just commercial," Klein said in a press release. "The new name is recognition of the true breadth of what our company has become, while still acknowledging that tremendous 'LC' history, he said.
Loveland Commercial moved earlier this month from the Thompson Valley Towne Center on Eagle Drive into a portion of a 28,000-square-foot building it bought and refurbished at 1712 Topaz Dr., off U.S. 34/East Eisenhower Boulevard. The move brought all its partners and employees into the same space.
“It’s been a lot easier to work and collaborate," Holsapple said. "We have space, privacy and a conference facility where we can collaborate; that’s so important for our business. We are still a Loveland-based company, but clearly a regional player in the marketplace, and this move signifies that evolution.”
Holsapple and Marostica created Loveland Commercial in 1996 after they purchased Moore Commercial and eventually changed the name. A year later, they brought on Blaine Rappe. Klein joined the company in 2004.
Klein and Rappe bought Marostica's interest in the company in 2012, when he retired, although he remains a major investor.
The firm now has three additional partners: Wayne Lewis, Nick Galluzzo and Rollin Goering.
LC Real Estate Group has several projects underway in Fort Collins including development of the King Soopers-anchored North College Marketplace, Storybrook residential development and an upcoming project in Spring Creek.
Holsapple and Marostica donated $1.5 million in 2004 to create the Loveland Commercial Endowed Chair at the Everitt Real Estate Center at Colorado State University, where Holsapple has served intermittently as executive director and taught for 20 years.
"It's a new era for LC Real Estate Group," Holsapple said. "I'm really excited for the future."
Eric J. Holsapple, MBA (CSU-84), PhD (CSU-96), CCIM, has worked in commercial real estate since 1984, and managed the U.S. operations for an international development firm until 1989. Holsapple started his own business in 1990 and concurrently earned his PhD in Economics from Colorado State University in 1996.
Since founding Loveland Commercial, a real estate brokerage and development firm, with partner Don Marostica in 1996, Holsapple has and has entitled and developed over 2,000 lots in residential sub-divisions including three affordable housing subdivisions as well as numerous commercial projects including the Thompson Valley Towne Center in Loveland, and North College Marketplace in Fort Collins, both anchored by King Soopers.
Holsapple has recently diversified into homebuilding and is currently building homes under “Midtown Homes” in Loveland and has built 45 homes in the last 12 months, despite a recession in the industry. Holsapple has lectured in real estate principles, finance, market analysis, and development classes for Colorado State University since 1995 and has published articles in finance, regional economics, international real estate, and real estate market analysis.
Holsapple was a founder and has twice served as the Interim Director of the Everitt Real Estate Center at Colorado State University. Holsapple and Marostica endowed the Loveland Commercial Chair in Real Estate at Colorado State University, currently held by Steve Laposa. Holsapple has previously served as Chair the Board of Directors of the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corporation and on the Board of Directors of Loveland Habitat for Humanity.
