The new construction home market has been in decline for some time now, but it is starting to pickup in a few areas. One of those areas is the Salt Lake Metro area which was named the 6th most active metro area for new construction home permits (source Trulia).

In the third quarter there were 2.64 new home permits per 1,000 existing homes in the Salt Lake Metro area. The two best areas were both in Texas, Houston 3.68 permits and Dallas 3.41 permits.

Those areas are that are now recovering are ones that experienced a combination of a milder recession, and a growing population (both things found in Salt Lake).

Even with this recent recovery, home building levels are still only a fraction of those seen in the mid 2000’s.

Garbett Homes is preparing to break ground for its Terra Sol green housing development. This 59 unit single family home community is being billed as ‘the greenest community in the state’. The development is located at 3545 South 300 East on 6.5 acres. Homes will have 1600 to 3000 sq. ft, small yards, 2 car garages, 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths and basements at prices starting at $200,000. They will have thermal solar systems similar to those found in their Daybreak Solaris Development. More information to follow…

You can read this Garbett Homes Terra Sol Green Housing Development article on my Salt Lake Real Estate Blog.

The Ivory Homes active adult community located at Daybreak’s Garden Park is set to expand its range of homes to include estate homes, condos and town homes. Currently there are two types of home on offer, Garden Homes and Patio Homes. Both of these home types offer single floor living, with Garden Homes having a basement, and Patio Homes sharing a common courtyard between the homes.

New to the community is the introduction of estate homes. Aimed at people who want to live in the community, but wish to have their own garden, estate homes offer the same single level living, but have their own lots.

The condos also offer single level living, with access via elevator to the top floor of the two story buildings. There are a total of 6 different floor plans, ranging from 900 to 1,400 square feet. Each unit comes with two indoor parking spaces.
The Garden Park town homes come in both rambler and 2-story floor plans, ranging in size from 1,100 to 1,500 square feet.

Pricing for the new home types start in the $180’s for a condo.

Just a quick note to let you know that the Utah Governor recently announced they will use $8 million in federal stimulus funds to reintroduce the Home Run Grant.

The official statement said that the state will offer $4,000 grants to the first 2,000 new home buyers.

The program comes on the heels of one started by former Gov. Jon Huntsman, who used $10 million in stimulus funds offer $6,000 grants. These grants were used in less than 12 weeks, so if you are interested in taking advantage of this offer you had better hurry.

There is one major difference between the original grant and this one (apart from the amount). The original grant could only be issued for homes that were ready for occupancy, while the new one can issued for homes which have been contracted for construction, or partially finished and contracted for completion. This changes the focus of the grant from getting rid of new home inventory to building new homes.

The new model home village is up and running in Daybreak. The village called Daybreak North Shore, is Daybreak’s third, the first two being Founders Village and East Lake Village. There is a noticeable difference in this phase, there are far more homes in the starter home category. If you are looking for homes under $200,000, Daybreak offers far more opportunities in North Shore than in the previous phases.

Builders Garbett Homes offer two styles of homes under $200,000, the ultra modern Bay Town Homes and Bay Lofts and Flats (coming in 2009). This increase in high-density homes seems to signal a change in policy by Kennecott, who have said that there will now be 20,000 homes in Daybreak, compared to the 13,000 when they first started. Maybe this is the result of the slowdown in the Salt Lake Real Estate market, where the low end of the market is still moving, but higher end of the market has slowed substantially.

Having said that Daybreak is building more high-density homes, Rainey who build higher-end homes have increased the size of their homes. Their largest home now weights in at more than 6,300 square feet.

Kennecott have brought in two new builders, Ivory and Garbett (although Garbett is not entirely new, they took over the building of condominiums in phase 1). There are also a few builders’ names missing from North Shore. Richmond American, Bangerter, and Liberty homes are all missing. After asking around the reason these builders are missing is that they still have a large quantity of lots remaining in East Lake Village.

A new introduction to North Shore is the concept of neighborhood retail. A small number of lots have been set aside for small shops / boutiques. This is something that I previously found missing from Daybreak, if they truly wanted to mimic areas like the Avenues then they had to introduce neighborhood stores, which they have now done.

There are also a number of custom home lots available, starting in the $600,000 range. Not sure how successful these will be, my understanding is that they have only sold 1 custom lot so far in East Lake Village.

I have updated our Salt Lake new homes map to incorporate the latest developments and pricing information. This interactive map uses Google Maps functionality to show the location and prices for the major new home builders and developments in Salt Lake County, Davis County, and Utah County. New home prices across the Salt Lake Valley are coming under pressure from the slowdown in the local housing market. Very few builders/developments have increased their prices, with most builders keeping their prices the same or lowering them slightly. Ivory Homes seems to have cut their prices the most, with the majority of developments showing substantial price declines.

Kennecott Land announced this week that it has broken ground on the next phase of its impressive Daybreak development located in South Jordan Utah. Unlike the previous phases which were residential this phase is mixed use. The first building to be started is the Daybreak Corporate Center. When complete the Village Center development will include office space, high density housing, retail space, and restaurant groups. 

Yesterday new home start figures were released which showed an increase of 0.8% from Feb to March. That’s the good news. Also on the same day builder confidence showed a downtown because of the increasing number of cancellations and a decease in sales due to the sub prime mess-up. Here is my take on the situation. I believe we were starting an upturn in the market (at least on the west coast) but now with the sub prime problem who knows what will happen.