Barry Halves Condos at $125M Downtown Project

The project is bounded by Jefferson Boulevard and Harrison, Brackenridge and Ewing streets. Acquest Realty Advisors is developing the $35 million, 250-room Courtyard by Marriott at the site.

Argie Bellio, VP of corporate sales for Coldwell Banker Roth Wehrly Graber, says his company has sold 12 of the now 30 units. Demand is high, Bellio tells GlobeSt.com, but buyers are afraid to make deals in this economy. "What is scaring everyone away is the market, not the product," he says. "We get four or five requests a week for more information on the units. But interest rates are keeping people from making a jump."

In the condo change, the developer had to lower the building from three stories to two, and from 25 units per floor to 15 per floor. This move did allow the company to make some units larger, Bellio says, with new sizes at an average 1,337 sf. Prices differ with the view, he says, with a skyline view's lowest price at $156,900, to a ballpark view's lowest price at $179,400. The highest priced condo is about $304,000, he says.

Speaking of the ballpark, the Wizards, a class-A baseball team affiliated with the San Diego Padres, are changing their name when they move into their new $30 million stadium. The team will be called the TinCaps, a name taken after Johnny Appleseed, who's buried in Fort Wayne. Almost 3,000 people sent in name suggestions after Hardball Capital, owner of the Wizards, had a public contest. Also, the stadium will be called Parkview Field, since local hospital Parkview Health pledged to pay $300,000 a year for 10 years for the naming rights in September. It's not clear what is happening to Memorial Stadium, built in the early 1990s for the Wizards, after it is torn down in July.

Bellio says the developer wants to be at half-capacity to break ground on the condo portion. "If we got three or four more sold, they'd start tomorrow," he says. "We're hoping to be completed by the end of summer 2009."