In January, Charleston, South Carolina-based multifamily owner, operator and developer Greystar broke ground on the first new vertical development in the City North master planned community in Phoenix — a 272-unit multifamily development.
The City North master-plan, developed by Costa Mesa, California-based Crown Realty & Development Corp., is located in the north section of the larger Desert Ridge master plan, directly adjacent to the existing High Street retail center. At full buildout, the 100-acre City North plan is expected to add a total of 3,000 apartment units, as well as 1.8 million square feet of corporate office space, 620 hotel rooms and up to 100,000 square feet of restaurants and retail.
In addition to Greystar’s development, the first phase of City North will include a four-story, 160,000-square-foot office complex expected to be complete next year. New multifamily developments for phases 2 and 3 are currently in the design phase, according to Billy Cundiff, managing director at Greystar.
The as-yet-unnamed luxury apartment community, expected to open in summer 2023, will offer a choice of 12 floor plans in one-, two- or three-bedroom configurations. Amenities will include a private pool, fitness center, coworking space, courtyard and multipurpose deck. Todd + Associates is the project’s architect, and Lawrence Lake Interiors is the interior designer.
"We're trying to be thoughtful about what we're naming each individual building and make sure there's a naming convention that's consistent with what we're trying to capture in the master plan, along with our partner [Crown Realty]," Cundiff said. "We should be able to release that in the next three to six months…[and then] we’ll also be able to talk about phases 2 and 3."
Commercial boom
The Phoenix metro area has seen a surge in new commercial and industrial construction starts in recent years, including two new Intel semiconductor plants that broke ground in Chandler, Arizona, in 2021. This in turn is driving new housing construction, according to Derek Wyatt, managing director at RCLCO's Los Angeles office.
The Phoenix market is expected to add 21,618 new apartment units this year alone, for a 5.7% increase in inventory. This growth follows a long-term trend; over 57,100 new units were delivered in Phoenix between 2011 and 2021, according to RealPage data.
"We've seen a lot of growth in the North Phoenix region, driven to a large extent by a lot of industrial development that's happening up there and throughout the area," Wyatt said.
Wyatt considers the area along Arizona's State Route 101 a strategic location, which City North is set to support with new retail and office development, as well as capture existing demand with new housing.
The area around City North is home to a large number of employment centers, both existing and in progress. American Express, the ASU Medical & Technology Campus and the Mayo Clinic are located just south of the development; all three sites are either undergoing or have completed multimillion-dollar expansions expected to add thousands of jobs to the area.
In total, project planners estimate that these three employers will support over 50,000 employees at full buildout.
"You take all these in together, and you start to feel like the quality of life that exists up in this area is really high," said Cundiff. "And then you have the proximity to all these outdoor amenities, and you've got shopping at Desert Ridge marketplace. For us, this confluence of the employment growth and the overall desirability of the area makes us feel like it's the right time to start building out the project and trying to capture a lot of those folks that are moving into the Phoenix metro."
