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Yesterday I wrote about local housing economist Alan Nevin’s bombshell that some units at Vantage Pointe might be rented out, like several downtown buildings that have turned condos into rentals. Between the Lofts at 777 6th Avenue, Atria, Smart Corner and Park Terrace, more than 250 condos that were built as for-sale units have been pulled from the market and rented.
Here was Nevin yesterday:
“I’ll tell you what I don’t know yet,” he said. “I don’t know if Vantage Pointe will ultimately be a condominium. I mean, they have said as much that if they don’t get the kind of reaction on the first round of closings, they’re going to have to turn it into rental.”
So last night I phoned Brian Stoddard, the president and COO of Calgary-based Pointe of View, Vantage Pointe’s developer. Last month, Stoddard told me he hadn’t “made any commitments as far as rental.”
He said the sales center at Vantage Pointe is fielding questions from potential buyers about how to finance a unit there because mortgages are harder to get these days. Stoddard said the company is “exploring all options at this point” for how to facilitate buyers in the building.
But when I asked him if the company had said it might rent out some of the units, he said, “That’s not something that we’ve said officially.”