Anyone been watching the Towering Inferno at Marquee Place?

the intersection of jamboree and campus has been around for a long time, there would be no mello roos associated with longstanding infrastructure, right? so the $1,200/month HOA seems awfully high assuming there is no mello roos component. well, no one said feeding an alligator was cheap!
 
<p>If I remember correctly, the high HOAs were due to the concierge services and amenties which were supposed to be much better than even a 5-star hotel.</p>

<p>By the way, I don't think the actual product sucks and would actually love to live in such a high rise. The biggest downfall for Marquee is its location and lack of restaurants and shopping to walk to. And obviously the pricing is rediculous. Also, for those wondering why someone would enjoy a high rise, I think its the draw to living in a hotel like environment. Its not for everyone but I spent 3 months in Hong Kong in a high rise and absolutely loved it. </p>
 
I don't remember if it's at the Marquee Place. Unless, it's at another luxury high rise but the HOAs include a 24 hour doctor on call.
 
<p>A free doctor ? LOL Sure, he/she might be on call in the building, but you'd still have to pay a bill.... I do recall NIR mentioning this some time ago.</p>

<p>Anywho...fumbling, you might be right about no Mello.... </p>
 
Higher end places in Long Beach are charging $6-900 a month so $1200 here sounds about right. Any way you cut it I would not want that extra expense every month regardless of the concierge. That guy would practically have to chew my food at each meal to justify his pay.
 
Okay, lets take a look at $1200 bucks, and what it gets you...





$1200


-$40 gym membership.


-$200 concierge service. (There is an internet/phone service, that I looked into and too lazy to get the link, that would be able to deliver the amount of service most people would need.)


-$35 for <a href="http://www.legendcellars.net/cellarstoreage.html">wine storage</a>. (I can't recall if Marquee offers this, but most do.)


-$30 for the parties hosted in the lounge. (Seriously, how much would you use this? <a href="http://www.legendcellars.net/about.html">Legendcellars</a> offers this, and the monthly cost I used seems high.)


-$50 valet. (Think about it! 300 units, $50 a month, equals $15k a month, and that is one hell of a high paid valet.)





Total HOA = $845. For what? So, they can wax the elevator doors? When they would probably screw it up, and put nasty streaks in it, just like Fletcher Jones does to cars. For that amount of money, my windows better be so clean, people would feel like they would fall out, because they can't tell if they exist. I would need Chinese laundry service. (For those who have not lived in SF or NYC, this is not a racial thing, this is what is called.) I would expect a well known chef in the building. <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/12/19/MNQCTT19C.DTL">I mean, the hi-rise builders get it in SF and have them</a>. Seriously, could you imagine what room service from Michael Mina or Gary Danko would be like? I would be willing to pay for that. Most importantly, I would need a massage with a happy ending once a week, and with so few people living there, I would expect two for one specials every month.





There is a place for rent, in the 3131 building, on the 13th floor, 1538 sqft., for $3300 a month. It is also for sale for $995k. Even if you do bullish math, it would not even make sense if you freebased the kool-aid to buy it.





I have said this before, and I am saying it again: Hi-rise/high density is an affordability product, and only when there is no more buildable land. Despite the bulls argument, there is plenty of land, and there is no real need for his product, at least not yet. But, there is absolutely no reason for a premium, when 60% of Marquee was non-owner occupied for this product. With all the units behind on their property taxes, I expect to see one of these at a <a href="http://ushomeauction.com/">REDC auction soon</a>. Like ISM said, this isn't the product we want, and there is a deference between supply side and demand side. It's too bad the builders are just repeating what they did in the 90s.
 
"my windows better be so clean, people would feel like they would fall out, because they can't tell if they exist." I imagine some of these "investors" will be trying to leap out of them soon so better put up some safety stickers just in case. That is tooo funny LOL!!!
 
OK ,maybe I have been reading too many conspiracy theory blogs but I had been tracking several condos in the Airport area and suddenly there are NO listings on redfin for ANY condos at Marquee or any of the other towers down there. Am I missing something or did they all burn down last week?
 
I don't think the fees include Mello-Roos. That was part of an earlier discussion I remember. Theoretically, if mello-roos fees are supposed to cover infrastructure in the development (roads, stoplights, etc.) then for a highrise, they should be particularly low since you have so many people sharing such little infrastructure. But apparently, its not set any lower. Maybe they'll be paid off faster?? I went on a tour for the Plaza building and CPW and remember that the HOA fees for both were about $1,000 a month, plus taxes and mello-roos, but (at least at CPW) it was the Santa Ana School District.
 
<p>Graph, I'm still laughing at your post...</p>

<p>For $1200 pm I'd expect:</p>

<p>1. The concierge to come up and make me a Cup of Tea when I need one.</p>

<p>2. Come up and help me find the Telly Remote when I lost it.</p>

<p>3. The Valet to give me a Piggy Back from the Elevator to the Car every morning, and back at night.</p>

<p>4. Pump the Tires on my Bicycle to the correct pressure, oil the chain and fill the water Bottles before each ride (and give me a Piggy Back to the Bike and back)</p>

<p>5. All of the Staff would be expected to call me "Master" or "Your Highness"....or something, especially in front of Friends (mine, not theirs).</p>

<p>Hey, maybe I could talk my Wife into getting a second Job so we could afford it...it all sounds pretty appealing to me!!</p>

<p></p>
 
Petah,





Now, that is funny. But, I still do not think you are expecting enough...





<em>1. The concierge to come up and make me a Cup of Tea when I need one.</em>





I want freshly shipped coffee beans from Kenya or Ethiopia, roasted to perfection there, ground to exact the right way for the air pressure, to make a divine cup every morning.


<p><em>2. Come up and help me find the Telly Remote when I lost it.</em></p>

<p>Not only do they find the remote, but they will sit there and listen for my commands of what I want changed on the remote. </p>

<p><em>3. The Valet to give me a Piggy Back from the Elevator to the Car every morning, and back at night.</em></p>

<p>The valet must be hawt, and have the ability to stop the elevator, without the alarm going off.


</p>

<p><em>4. Pump the Tires on my Bicycle to the correct pressure, oil the chain and fill the water Bottles before each ride (and give me a Piggy Back to the Bike and back)</em></p>

<p>Since I am not into riding as much as I should... I would expect routine car maintenance, oil changes, filters, fluids, brakes, etc.


</p>

<p><em>5. All of the Staff would be expected to call me "Master" or "Your Highness"....or something, especially in front of Friends (mine, not theirs).</em></p>

<p>That, and they would roll out the red carpet (literally) when needed. Every Friday, they would have the perfect Martini, every time. When I have a girl coming back to the graph pad, then the rose petals better be out, my place better be spotless, candles lit, and all the pr0n better be in storage, er maybe not.</p>

BTW, I saw plenty on ZipRealty, so... no one burned them down, er yet. But, I do know there will be some foreclosures here. It is difficult to make your penthouse payments, when you are in jail, and can't make all that much money.
 
I have been waiting with baited breath for those foreclosures. It stuns me we havn't seen any yet. That bohemoth is one of the shining memorials to the greed, avarice and arrogance that was the housing bubble.
 
You know, $1200/month is basically $40/day. Sure I would not pay that, but for folks with money, that's not too much. I know people who spend that much each and every day on food. Others spend that much weekly for a massage. For doctors or lawyers who make $500/day, that's less than 10% of their daily income. And for really good lawyers who make $500 in 2 hours, that's chump change. And for plastic surgeons who can make $5000 in 3 hours, that's even a negligible amount. I know a surgeon who easily spends 10K a night at a casino. So I guess it's all relative.
 
I would think that behemoth office building right in front of the Marquee Place North Korea Towers would subtract even more value for the condos facing that big blue box. How the prices are not imploding with the high HOAs is beyond me.
 
<p>When was the last resale?</p>

<p>Is it possible that the gap between buyers and sellers has imploded so bad that no resale transactions have completed? Have any closed since August? How many sold all of last year and when?</p>
 
That big box is a see-through. No tenents so you can see right through to your previous views of the lovely 405 freeeway. What a joke
 
Irvine Renter



Do what you can to write up a piece on the "High Rise Irvine" disaster. You sure know we wont read it in the Register.

Lansner should get off his dead a** and look at doing something like a multipart story on this very subject. But nobody over at the Register has half a brain. We will see it in the OC Weekly first.



Now with the new Lennar Astoria going up across Jamboree and the HUGE hole in the ground next to it. There is a story in itself. I guess thats the parking for Central Park West. This urban blight on the city of Irvine will take years if not a decade to fix itself. In the meantime the city and the business around this urban mistake just sit and wait for the market to turn or Lennar and its Co-investors to go belly up.
 
blt, short term memory problems? Odd definition of urban blight, that site used to be a huge industrial building run by parker hanafin. Sure, it'll take time to build, not uncommon with any construction project (this ain't sim city ya know), but I don't see why you would consider high end condos with public open space areas a blight, especially when the original use was a manufacturing plant. Urban mistake? What was the alternative on this site, dog park? Great Park Jr? sports park number 29?



Hmmm, interesting "guess" about the hole in the ground and it's use as "horseless carriage parking", but I personally think it's for either an a) underground skyscraper or b) a sweet skate park.



Ha, much bitterness in this forum i do sense.



Anybody have any info on that macarthur place high rise - I think prices were top of the market there and hoa's were just as high, if not higher.
 
Long term and short term memory is excellent. So is my spelling of the company that used to be on that site. I used to call on Parker Hannifin years ago as a sales rep. Yes a mistake. That property is going to sit empty for years. Unoccupied. Not bitterness but the fact that the city expects a development and Lennar to finish a project. Lennar just gets to walk away and leave the developer and the city in the lurch. All the while we look at an empty HOLE. So we should let Irvine start looking like Chandler Arizona ??? Thats the issue IMHO. That Parker Hannifin building was better looking than that POS that Lennar has erected. Just what we need Cental Park West. More tiny rat holes for $600K Plus and unoccupied high rises.
 
This isn't arizona, this is litigous california and there are completion bonds in place with the city and a completion guarantee with the lender. Lennar can sell for cents on the dollar, but walk away? Your scenario is not well thought out. For one, Lennar knows it leaves itself open to a signifigant amount legal exposure by leaving a half completed project, two it will never do business in Irvine again (including great park), three as this is a jv, it's financial partners would never let the company walk away from the several hundred million dollars already spent on land, fees, and construction. And if you think the jv protects lennar from the exposure of the spent money, that's not the case as no bank would loan this much money unless they had some recourse to collect if the deal fell through and that the company had the financial capability to repay. And if Lennar does somehow walk away, great, an opportunistic developer will come in, grab the property on the cheap, and quickly finish off as apartments, i'd even say that's the best case scenario (which would never happen).



If the project is completed but unoccupied, why do you care? There will be sales staff and security on site, it's not like this is detroit or an exurb where there's nothing around or the land values at zero. This was no mistake on the part of the city, as this is clearly a higher and better use, parcer ghanuhfen needed to move as the building was outdated. The mistake here was the timing of the developer.



Haha, you're bothered by that empty hole are you? Hmmm, since that's fenced off and you only really see it in two places one being for three seconds as you exit on to jamboree and the other being a condo in marquee place, i'm guessing you're blaming that hole as the reason you can't' sell your investment property in the hi-rise. I sense conflict of interest.
 
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