Category: Kamloops Real Estate News

This article appeared in the Kamloops This Week on July 18th, 2012 and was written by Andrea Klassen.

A re-design of a controversial proposed strata slated for land next to Aberdeen elementary school is getting solid reviews from city staff.

Though council already agreed to give Craftsman Ventures another public hearing to try to rezone 2171 Van Horne Dr., the development was back at council on Tuesday, July 17, for a few housekeeping measures that weren’t passed during the original reconsideration vote.

The developer is asking to have the 2.2-hectare parcel rezoned from church to medium-density multi-family.

Under the new design, the strata would have 58 units of duplex, triplex and apartment-style housing.

The original 64-unit plan was shot down by council in May due to concerns about how the development managed ground and storm water in an area with a history of water and slope-stability issues.

But city planning and development manager Randy Lambright said the new design, which directs storm water into a city gully east of the property, is a good solution to the problem.

“We are very comfortable with what they’re proposing,” he told council.

“It’s likely better than what they were proposing initially.”

The strata plan hasn’t been popular in the Aberdeen neighbourhood, however.

At the last public hearing more than 100 people showed up to raise issues with the plan. In addition to water issues, residents raised concerns about privacy, traffic and a loss of views.

Residents were also unhappy the property they had expected to some day house a church might instead hold rental housing.

Most dwellings in the area are single-family homes, and several residents argued the strata would change the character of the neighbourhood.

During an appeal to council in June, Rob Gobelle of TRUE Consulting — who spoke on behalf of developer — said the new design was meant to deal with some of those neighbourhood issues.

The nearest buildings are now 29 metres from nearby homes, instead of eight, and the number of visitor parking stalls on site was upped to keep traffic from spilling onto other streets.

Craftsman Ventures will pitch the updated site plan to Aberdeen residents at an open house at Aberdeen elementary on Monday, July 23, at 7 p.m.

This article appeared in the Kamloops Daily News on July 6th, 2012.

Commercial and institutional construction is keeping builders in Kamloops busy while residential work is lagging slightly from last year.

City acting chief building inspector Bruce Barclay said Friday the first half of this year has seen construction values surpass $100 million. Last year at this time, those values were at $84 million.

The main driver behind that is business and institutional projects, he said.

For example, there’s a new $12.2-million seniors’ residence going up on Tranquille Road in Brocklehurst.

Single family construction is at $20 milion halfway through the year, while it was at $21.3 million at this point in 2011. Multi-family is down a bit, too, but expected to move upward as demand in that market rises.

Barclay said by the end of the year, he expects the construction-value total to be around $175 million. Pretty good, given an average year in Kamloops is between $120 and $140 million, and that the economy is still considered to be relatively flat.

“We’re on for a very strong year,” he said.

There are still some big-number projects expected to come through City Hall for permits this year, including Telus’s $30-million data centre, $6 million for Walmart’s expansion and $6.5 million for Target’s renovations to its Zellers location.

Kamloops has always paced itself well where commercial and residential construction is concerned, Barclay said.

“We’ve never done a Kelowna or a Vancouver to build it and they will come,” he said.

Instead, the buildings have been constructed as they’ve been needed.

“That’s the way most of our builders work. They’re not going to build without there being something there.”

City community development manager Randy Lambright said the numbers are encouraging, especially given the economy is being described as sluggish to recover from the 2008 recession.

“It’s all good and it can only get better, depending what happens with new industry coming into town with or without Ajax mine,” he said, adding there’s interest from other businesses in coming to town.

“It’s a manageable rate of growth.”

Housing prices are driving a growing interest in multi-family housing, which is raising more questions at City Hall about density and what should be encouraged for infill.

But, overall, all the construction figures for this year are positive, even on the housing side, he said.

This article appeared on the Vancouver Sun on June 19th, 2012 and was written by Jeff Lee.

One of Canada’s best golf courses, the Tobiano Golf Course on Kamloops Lake, has been put up for court-ordered sale for $5.5 million.

The Thomas McBroom-designed 18-hole course, ranked as the sixth best public course in Canada and No. 16 in SCOREGolf’s Top 100 courses in Canada, was seized by the Business Development Bank of Canada last year after developer Mike Grenier was ousted by two banks that placed his overall Tobiano Resort complex into receivership.

The adjacent resort continues to be administered by a receiver acting for BMO. But in May B.C. Supreme Court allowed the Crown-owned BDBC to proceed with a sale of the golf course because it had specific guarantees tied to the golf course lands. .

Vancouver-based NAI Commercial Real Estate, which just listed the golf course on Multiple Listing Services, says the 231-acre golf course includes a clubhouse, pro shop and licensed 120-seat restaurant, course maintenance facilities, paved roads and parking.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

This article appeared in the Kamloops This Week on June 7th, 2012 and was written by Andrea Klassen.

A jump in residential construction, coupled with some big-ticket projects on the horizon, has the city of Kamloops rethinking its building-permit estimates for 2012.

In May, the city issued about $20 million in residential permits, more than double the $8.7 million it issued in 2011.

The permits included 15 new single family dwellings and 115 new multi-family units.

In May 2011, the number of multi-family units added was eight.

Acting director of development services Kundan Bubbar said developers are rushing to fill a residential void left by several quiet construction years.

“For the last couple years, we haven’t seen too many new residential houses being built,” he said.

“Now, the inventory is almost diminishing and builders are taking advantage of low rates and also the demand in the market.”

Permits are being issued mainly in Aberdeen, Westsyde, Batchelor Heights and Juniper.

To date, the city has issued more that $79 million in permits, up from $68 million at this time last year.

While the city had expected to issue between $120 and $140 million in permits this year, Bubbar said it’s now looking like Kamloops will be on par with last year, when permits totalled just over $162 million.

“It shows the city is not in the same position as the other Okanagan cities are, where things are slowing down,” he said.

“We are still doing better than the average.”

Commercial construction is also up slightly over last year, with $2.8 million in permits, compared to 2011’s $1.5 million.

Bubbar said there are also a few major projects coming which should keep permit stats high, including the $30-million Telus Data Centre, which is expected to finish the permitting process later this year, and several seniors’ residences in the works for the North Shore.