Office project planned for Northwest Austin
Crimson Real Estate Fund LP has acquired control of 21.5 acres of land in Northwest Austin, where it plans to build a 250,000-square-foot office project.
The land is at Lake Creek Parkway and Pecan Park Boulevard, just east of U.S. 183, and adjacent to the 205,000square-foot Aspen Lake One office building that Crimson owns. The planned office project, which would have two buildings each with 125,000 square feet, is to be developed by Patrinely Group LLC, Crimson’s development management affiliate.
In November, Crimson Services, the property management and leasing affiliate of the Crimson fund, had Aspen Lake One fully leased within 18 months of taking the assignment. Major tenants in the building include Q2ebanking, LDR Spine USA, Informatica Corp. and Regus. Dennis Tarro of Crimson Services, and Ben Tolson and Bart Matheney of Aquila Commercial represented the landlord in all lease transactions.
Crimson Real Estate Fund acquires and repositions real estate opportunities in key growth markets across the country. WASHINGTON — U.S. builders broke ground on fewer homes in November after starting work in October at the fastest pace in four years. Superstorm Sandy likely slowed starts in the Northeast.
The Commerce Department said Wednesday that builders began construction of houses and apartments at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 861,000. That was 3 percent less than October’s annual rate of 888,000, the fastest since July 2008.
On Wall Street, stocks closed lower Wednesday as a year-end deadline nears with no deal in hand how to cut the U.S. government’s budget deficit. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 99 points to end at 13,252 Wednesday, following two days of 100-point gains. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index lost 11 points to 1,436. The Nasdaq composite index also fell 11 points to end at 3,044.
The decline in housing starts follows months of strong gains. Housing starts remain on track for their best year in four years, and the housing market overall appears to be sustaining its recovery.
An encouraging trend was that applications for building permits, a sign of future construction, rose to 899,000 in November, the most since July 2008.
“Growth in housing starts was extremely strong in the prior three months … so some giveback is not a concern at this point,” said Robert Kavcic, an economist at BMO Capital Markets.
Housing starts fell 5.2 percent in the Northeast from October to November. Starts in the West fell 19.2 percent. Over the past year, housing starts have declined nearly 26 percent in the Northeast, the only region to record a year-overyear drop. That suggests that Sandy slowed construction in the region.
The overall slide in construction in November was due mostly to single-family homes. Builders began work on 4.1 percent fewer singlefamily homes than in October. Construction of apartment