Farwell Building to be saved?

[buildingsofdetroit]

I am stunned by this news:


Deal is pending to spend $3.3 million to buy the Farwell Building: http://tinyurl.com/ygmr5bm


More on Farwell: http://tinyurl.com/yhf4cpu

[DetroitZack]

You beat me to it. But this is great news. Capitol Park has so much potential.

[buildingsofdetroit]

You beat me to it. But this is great news. Capitol Park has so much potential.

I wondered, at first, if the DEGC was buying it to level it. But at $3.3 million, that'd be one REALLY expensive parking lot - even before you add in the price of demo.

[Novine]

Nothing in the article stated that the building would actually be saved or renovated.

[3WC]

The Freep online says the building will be redeveloped.

I view what's going on in Detroit from afar, down here in TX. It tends to cut down the stink, but there are reports this deal is causing folks in Oklahoma City to complain to their local air pollution office.

Let's see if I have this right. The State is broke. The City is insolvent. The State, however, is giving $3.3 million to the DEGC to acquire the Farwell Bldg. Not to rehab it, but to merely acquire it.

The State says it would "like to have paid less" [[no shit) but "the owner wouldn't budge on price. " Well, duh, who would when dealing with those yo-yo's" Three friends and I made a run at the building in the '80's [[before the Tiffany skylights were vandalized), and we refused to pay more than a couple of hundred thousand dollars as I recall. I guess we weren't that smart after all.

In the Freep article, Ferchill was quoted as saying he'd love to rehab the building but it doesn't make any economic sense.

The DEGC has clearly outdone itself. Not too long ago it paid $10 million for 3 bldgs in [[I can't remember the area =-its where Ferchill built that little hotel) - buildings worth no more than $4 million in the aggregate. At least in this case those idiots have used State money. Dumb and dumber.

Who's at fault. You MI/Detroit taxpayers. Lotsa luck folks.

Higgins, you are a genius. You should be in jail for highway robbery, but since you didn't use a gun, you get a pass -- and a medal.

[buildingsofdetroit]

The DEGC has clearly outdone itself. Not too long ago it paid $10 million for 3 bldgs in [[I can't remember the area =-its where Ferchill built that little hotel) - buildings worth no more than $4 million in the aggregate. At least in this case those idiots have used State money. Dumb and dumber.

$3.3 million for a building that has been vandalized [[Tiffany glass chandeliers gone, tiles busted), stripped [[gorgeous, ornate railings in the rotunda) and open to trespass and the elements [[hobos and water damage) for 20 years. That's more than twice the cost of bringing down the Lafayette Building, which mothballing, by the way, the DEGC was crazy and "didn't make sense."

[EastsideAl]

Sad. They bought a once-beautiful building that has been allowed to become a stripped out hulk, for a ludicrous amount of money that once could have saved the building [[and then some). And in the process they awarded and enriched one of the city's biggest assholes. Am I the only one to smell a fix in the DEGC? Or is it just plain idiocy?

[bibs]

He now has some of the money needed to renovate the Broderick Town. http://www.brodericktower.com/ Right! Yeah, right.

[buildingsofdetroit]

I'm surprised PQZ hasn't come rushing to defend the DEGC's decision on this one. Maybe there simply is no sane reason for such a high price. I'm all for saving the Farwell, but $300,000 would have been a more realistic price than more than $3 million.

[Gistok]

Now to wonder what the Witherell Corp. [[Michael Higgins) plans to do with that $3.3 million... besides paying back taxes.

Maybe he could start a much needed fixup of the Broderick Tower exterior until the financial/housing situation improves. It would be nice to get rid of the covered scaffolding walkways along the sidewalk of the building.

I know... "don't hold your breath"...

[DetroitDad]

Or fix the elevators in the only property he owns that has an income [[Leland House Apartments)

http://detroityes.com/mb/showthread.php?t=3076

[Lorax]

Wasn't the Guardian Building sold recently for something like 4 million? This makes no sense.

That money would have been better spent mothballing several buildings downtown.

[buildingsofdetroit]

Wasn't the Guardian Building sold recently for something like 4 million? This makes no sense.

That money would have been better spent mothballing several buildings downtown.

Not quite, but comparing what you get for the Guardian and what you get with the Farwell, it might as well have been $4 million. From the Free Press on July 19, 2007:

"Ficano announced the county's signed agreement to buy the landmark Guardian Building in downtown Detroit for $14.5 million, the vacant Detroit Savings and Loan Bank building nearby for $2 million and a parking structure at Fort and First streets for $17 million."

[wolverine]

Hopefully this one can have a good future. The lightcourt in the interior is amazing.

[mwilbert]

I hope something good comes of this, but there is really no doubt that this is an absurd price. That building had squatters in it 20 years ago. If the DEGC is going to let themselves be held up by anybody who owns a building in an area that might someday be redeveloped, they are going to have to find a lot more money someplace.

It is in the building owners' interest to see the areas in which they own buildings redeveloped. The DEGC should focus on areas where the owners are willing to accept plausible prices. Maybe that isn't possible given the concentration of ownership?

[Fnemecek]

I'm surprised PQZ hasn't come rushing to defend the DEGC's decision on this one. Maybe there simply is no sane reason for such a high price.

The lack of a sane reason for the DEGC doing something has never stopped PQZ from defending them before. On a different thread, he defended their decision to spend $700 per window to have plywood installed covering some of the broken windows on the Metropolitan Building - a price that any contractor or architect will tell you is way out of line.

Could it be that the DEGC has finally done something so obviously corrupt and/or stupid that not even PQZ will defend them?

[Lorax]

PQZ and I have fought this one over the Lafayette ad nauseum.

Here in Miami properly mitigating buildings for future use, which should be more expensive given the hurricanes, constant summer rain and mold issues with humidity, actually costs much less than PQZ's cost analyses for Detroit buildings.

Again, there are dozens of buildings sitting vacant in Detroit without proper mothballing, and have been for decades without a problem, and are still restorable. It's a specious argument that is won by common sense action, such as turning around buildings newly acquired by the city for back taxes, putting them up for auction with no minimum bidding.

Get them back on the tax rolls as quickly as possible. If there is no bidding, spend a reasonable amount on sealing up the lower floors of a building with intact upper floor windows, make sure the roof is stable, and continue marketing it.

This is a problem almost unique to Detroit. No other large city has the level of waste and abandonment, and the courts need to pursue landlords/owners for fines related to owning unsafe properties. If everyone did their jobs, there wouldn't be a problem.

[Fnemecek]

Here in Miami properly mitigating buildings for future use, which should be more expensive given the hurricanes, constant summer rain and mold issues with humidity, actually costs much less than PQZ's cost analyses for Detroit buildings.

Well, in defense of PQZ's estimates, one must remember to factor in all of the cash that George Jackson and everyone else at the DEGC are skimming off every project that happens in Detroit.

This is a problem almost unique to Detroit. No other large city has the level of waste and abandonment, and the courts need to pursue landlords/owners for fines related to owning unsafe properties. If everyone did their jobs, there wouldn't be a problem.

People doing their jobs. That is my dream for Detroit.

[1KielsonDrive]

Another MH project. When will the idiots in the bureaucracy learn?

[Novine]

I read the article again. Nowhere is there a statement that the building will be rehabbed. It states that it will be part of a broader redevelopment effort but that could mean demo'ing the building to "create a more desirable building site" to use the Geo. Jackson rationale for every other demolition.

If the DEGC is actually acquiring the building to preserve it for future re-use, will they actually make the effort to secure the building? Or will they follow the usual DEGC playbook of demolition by neglect?

[gumby]

I read the article again. Nowhere is there a statement that the building will be rehabbed. It states that it will be part of a broader redevelopment effort but that could mean demo'ing the building to "create a more desirable building site" to use the Geo. Jackson rationale for every other demolition.

If the DEGC is actually acquiring the building to preserve it for future re-use, will they actually make the effort to secure the building? Or will they follow the usual DEGC playbook of demolition by neglect?

How bout you reread the article again and read the part where it says the State Land Bank is aquiring the building not the DEGC. George Jackson was just quoted in the article not listed as the buyer.

The State of Michigan’s Land Bank Fast Track Authority is planning to spend $3.3 million to buy the vacant and dilapidated Farwell Building at 1249 Griswold as part of what could become a widespread redevelopment of downtown Detroit’s Capitol Park district

First sentence in the article.

[Lorax]

Sounds like a deal has been made- so when is GJ getting his new pool and cabana? Oh, that's right, next spring when the ground is soft again, and after he's returned from his tour of Europe to look at all the fantastic architecture.

[Lorax]

Not quite, but comparing what you get for the Guardian and what you get with the Farwell, it might as well have been $4 million. From the Free Press on July 19, 2007:

"Ficano announced the county's signed agreement to buy the landmark Guardian Building in downtown Detroit for $14.5 million, the vacant Detroit Savings and Loan Bank building nearby for $2 million and a parking structure at Fort and First streets for $17 million."

Thanks for clarifying that. Funny, how here in Miami, even in this economy, three ugly ranch houses on small lots on Biscayne Bay, only a couple of blocks from here would sell for 14 million combined. And in Detroit you get the Guardian Building! No justice-

[Fnemecek]

Thanks for clarifying that. Funny, how here in Miami, even in this economy, three ugly ranch houses on small lots on Biscayne Bay, only a couple of blocks from here would sell for 14 million combined. And in Detroit you get the Guardian Building! No justice-

Well, that's just one reason to pull up stakes in Miami and head north.

[Novine]

"How bout you reread the article again and read the part where it says the State Land Bank is aquiring the building not the DEGC."'

Even more reason to think that the building isn't planned for redevelopment. Read this from earlier in the month:

http://www.detnews.com/article/20091...cant-buildings