High-rise condos 75 percent sold in opening week

As seen in The Seat­tle Times.

NEXUS — a 382-unit, 41-sto­ry con­do­mini­um project — sold more than 270 homes in the week fol­low­ing its pub­lic sales event on March 18.

SEATTLE — The Rubik’s Cube-like archi­tec­ture of NEXUS isn’t the only thing stacked up in down­town Seat­tle. So are the buy­ers.

In anoth­er sign of Seattle’s white-hot real estate mar­ket, NEXUS — a 382-unit, 41-sto­ry high-rise con­do­mini­um project — sold more than 270 homes dur­ing the past week, which offi­cials call a record for new home unit absorp­tion in the North­west.

The pub­lic sales event for NEXUS, which occurred on March 18, marked the open­ing of the project’s sales cen­ter at 2609 First Ave. in Bell­town. Prospec­tive buy­ers report­ed­ly arrived by 5 a.m. to secure their place in line.

“NEXUS blew through Seat­tle like a hur­ri­cane last week­end, expos­ing the pent-up demand for home­own­er­ship in a city that seems oth­er­wise for rent,” says Dean Jones, pres­i­dent and CEO of Realog­ics Sotheby’s Inter­na­tion­al Real­ty. “The good news is we still have about 95 homes to offer, so it’s not too late for those that want to own their slice of this expand­ing sky­line.

Remain­ing homes include one- and two-bed­room home plans from around $800,000 to two-sto­ry SkyLofts for more than $2.5 mil­lion.

NEXUS buy­ers can lock in their pur­chase price now and per­son­al­iz­ing their inte­ri­or design options for occu­pan­cy by mid-2019. Jones says NEXUS, which broke ground this mon­th, is like­ly the only high-rise con­do­mini­um to deliv­er homes before the start of the next decade, not­ing the pro­tract­ed per­mit­ting process and chal­leng­ing con­struc­tion mar­ket that devel­op­ers are fac­ing with high-rise con­struc­tion.

“We are thrilled to have this over­whelm­ing sales endorse­ment for what’s now become a shared vision in the next gen­er­a­tion of urban liv­ing,” says Chris­tian Chan, exec­u­tive vice pres­i­dent of Bur­rard Group, the devel­op­er of NEXUS. “It would appear the mar­ket has been wait­ing for this oppor­tu­ni­ty, and for those who act soon, they too can join in the excite­ment and the ben­e­fits of a rapid­ly ascend­ing mar­ket.”

The NEXUS sales cen­ter includes a full-scale, ful­ly fur­nished two-bed­room mod­el home.

Bur­rard has built a 5,000-square-foot sales cen­ter facil­i­ty that includes a full-scale, ful­ly fur­nished two-bed­room mod­el home. With inte­ri­ors designed by Weber Thomp­son, the space fea­tures many of the attrib­ut­es avail­able at NEXUS, includ­ing over­size win­dows and Euro­pean-inspired kitchens.

The kitchens are seam­less­ly inte­grat­ed into the home thanks to built-in appli­ances with match­ing cab­i­net pan­els. The mod­el includes a Ger­man-engi­neered Blomberg refrig­er­a­tor and dish­wash­er, Ital­ian-designed Ful­gor Milano range and induc­tion cook­top, Blan­co under­mount sink with Gro­he facet, and quartz coun­ter­tops with match­ing full-height slab back­splash.

The liv­ing rooms fea­ture wide-plank oak floors with the option of extend­ing them into the bed­rooms. Buy­ers can choose from three col­or schemes and per­son­al­ize their stor­age with Cal­i­for­nia Clos­ets.

A col­lec­tion of home enter­tain­ment, secu­ri­ty, cli­mate con­trol and win­dow cov­er­ing offer­ings by Wipli­ance is avail­able. And the exclu­sive-to-project app “XEN” being devel­oped by Sirqul ties in pre­ferred ven­dor hard­ware and con­trols with a touch of the but­ton, and con­nects home­own­ers to par­tic­i­pate in build­ing and neigh­bor­hood ameni­ties and spe­cial offer­ings.

“Buy­ers are cer­tain­ly drawn to the design fea­tures of the homes, but also love the exten­sive ameni­ties pro­vid­ed in the build­ing and the through­out the neigh­bor­hood,” says Michael Can­non, the sales direc­tor at NEXUS.

Com­mon areas com­prise more than 21,000 square feet and span mul­ti­ple lev­els of the tow­er. A lob­by lounge includes a concierge, pack­age stor­age and access to both a café retail and des­ti­na­tion restau­rant space that flanks the entry.

On the sev­en­th floor, the Podi­um Club will have co-work­ing spaces, meet­ing rooms, a media lounge and the­ater, a wrap-around veran­da, a dog lounge with both inte­ri­or and exte­ri­or spaces as well as a dog wash bay, and a fit­ness cen­ter.

Rather than plac­ing pent­house homes atop the build­ing, NEXUS fea­tures a full-floor Sky Lounge and rooftop ter­race with views of the city and beyond.

Above it all is the 41st-floor Sky Lounge, which boasts pent­house-lev­el ben­e­fits for all home­own­ers. Fea­tures include a fireside lounge over­look­ing South Lake Union, an exhi­bi­tion kitchen, a cov­ered Sky Par­lor with firepit, a Sky Gar­den sun­deck, a bar­be­cue area with out­door seat­ing, a cater­ing kitchen and pri­vate din­ing room, and a games room — all with expan­sive views of down­town Seat­tle and the sur­round­ing neigh­bor­hoods.

Can­non says home­buy­ers at NEXUS are keep­ing close tabs on com­mu­ni­ty and polit­i­cal momen­tum for a new “lid” over I-5 that would span the dis­tance between the east and west side of the free­way and between the bridges of Den­ny Way, Olive Way and Pine Street, effec­tive­ly extend­ing Free­way Park north­ward to Den­ny Way. If con­struct­ed, the cav­i­ty caused by I-5 would be replaced with a mas­sive pub­lic park and recre­ation­al devel­op­ment, link­ing four neigh­bor­hoods. More infor­ma­tion can be found at LidI5.org.

Can­non encour­ages any­one con­sid­er­ing a pur­chase in down­town Seat­tle, at any price point, to vis­it the NEXUS sales cen­ter.  He says it’s not uncom­mon for changes to occur with inven­to­ry because pre­sale buy­ers con­sid­er oth­er homes in the build­ing, and some won’t be approved for financ­ing pur­pos­es.