It was a familiar Las Vegas night -- with well-heeled power brokers, waif-looking models and young hipsters mingling together at one of those invite-only events, exchanging gossip and handshakes in between martinis and business cards. On this occasion, however, swimsuit goddess Pamela Anderson, American Idol emcee Ryan Seacrest and actor Mickey Rourke were on hand, among other VIPs, giving the evening some star wattage and celebrity cache. But it wasn't a club opening or a Scientology benefit. It was a groundbreaking for a new high-rise condominium.
"There are 60,000 condominium and 19,000 condo-hotel units currently proposed, planned or under construction in the Las Vegas Valley," said John Restrepo, a local real estate analyst. "But than less than 25 percent of those units are expected to be built within the next five years."
Laurence Hallier's Panorama Towers is one of the few to make the cut. On April 21, Hallier celebrated the groundbreaking of the third of four planned towers at 4631 Dean Martin Drive, between Harmon and Tropicana avenues. Panorama's first two 33-story blue glass towers sold out with prices ranging from $400,000 to more than $12 million for the penthouse suites. Residents are expected to start moving in this summer. The third tower is also almost sold out, in spite of a 30 percent price hike.
Panorama's success comes in the wake of recent project cancellations, including the Hard Rock's $1.4 billion, 1,420-unit Flats, Bungalows, and Residences at Harmon Avenue and Paradise Road, and the Curve's 389 units at Durango Road and the Beltway. And those follow on the heels of last year's R.I.P. list that included Related's 514-unit Icon Las Vegas at 200 Convention Center Drive, Diversified Real Estate Concepts' 825-unit Aqua Blue at 4178 Koval Lane and Freddie Schinz's 568-unit Krystal Sands at Las Vegas and Riviera boulevards.
It's tough getting a high-rise off the ground. It takes experience, salesmanship, a good location and most of all money. But lenders won't finance a project until 70 percent or more of the residences are under hard contract. Reaching that point, however, can be tricky since a project needs cash to open a sales center and hire a staff.
Developers, as a result, are now turning to celebrities to help hawk their pricey pads. Some simply name-drop, letting loose that some buyers are famous, while others hire celebrities to market a project. The strategy has yielded mixed results, thus far. Hallier, for instance, revealed that Leonardo DiCaprio and Pamela Anderson bought residences at Panorama Towers and it worked like a charm. Who wouldn't want to borrow a cup of sugar from those two? Related, meanwhile, announced that baseball great Reggie Jackson had purchased a unit at Icon, but it still couldn't keep the project from going under.
Related, for its Las Ramblas project, went so far as to make actor George Clooney a partner. The $3 billion planned development calls for 11 condo-hotel towers along Harmon, between Koval and Paradise. Clooney has since pulled out, amid reports of sluggish sales. Related may kill the project all together, say industry sources.
Similarly, Australian developer Victor Altomare unveiled plans for an 80-story condominium project called the Summit in August 2004. The planned skyscraper at Sahara Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard was supposed to break ground early last year, but slow sales delayed construction. It eventually led to Ivana Trump becoming a project partner last summer. The development was then re-branded "The Ivana," but it still wasn't enough. Now the project and parcel are being offered for sale.
Donald Trump, by contrast, who acts as his own celebrity brand, has seen strong success with his self-named $500 million, 64-story condo-hotel, behind the New Frontier hotel-casino on the Strip. The project sold its 1,282 units in just four days, despite sale prices of $600,000 to $6 million.
"We have a waiting list of 2,000 names," said The Donald during a July 12 groundbreaking ceremony. "So we are moving ahead with a second tower, which will have a 35 percent price increase."
Yet luxury high-rise homes remain hit and miss in Las Vegas. The valley had only seen two completed projects up until 2000, with Irwin Molasky's Park Towers in the Hughes Center and Turnberry Place at Paradise and Riviera.
Affordable housing and cheap, abundant land have long made high-rise living unnecessary. But the economic landscape has dramatically changed in recent years, resulting in the valley's rapid urbanization. New projects have sprung up from nowhere, offering super-cool, glossy high-rise homes for $500 to $1,400 per square foot. And while such extravagance seems well out of reach for most wage earners, many projects have sold out. The winners had big enough budgets to offset rising building costs, which have increased 14 percent and more during the last year alone, say industry observers.
Others have opted to cash out and capitalize on the valley's current real estate boom. Altomare, for instance, sold the .68-acre parcel for his planned Liberty Towers project along the Strip in early January for $5.5 million. The deal resulted in a 600 percent markup over its original $900,000 purchase price in 2004, county records show.
"I've been happy to see the project cancellations," said Bruce Hiatt, president of Luxury Realty Group of Las Vegas, a local firm specializing in high-rise residences. "It has created a more stable, less frenzied market where supply and demand are coming more into balance."
Tony Illia is a local freelance journalist. He can be reached at tonyillia@aol.com.
http://www.lasvegascitylife.com/articles/2006/04/27/local_news/news02.prt

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