Lake Placid back in the River Landing game
Following what Mayor Don Atchison described as “the most due diligence that the city has done on any land sale,” an agreement was struck with Lake Placid Developments to purchase “Parcel Y” at River Landing in Saskatoon’s Central Business District for a price of $5,240,494 yesterday.
Star Phoenix writer David Hutton is reporting that “City council, sitting as an executive committee, made the decision in private Tuesday afternoon to advertise the land sale before it was announced at the evening council meeting. The sale still requires the blessing of city council on June 14 because the purchase is for less than market value.”
Recent appraisals on the land suggested a market value of approximately $11 million. Lake Placid had previously purchased the land for $4.8 million but lost it to the city when they failed to meet payment deadlines in October of last year.
On March 22 of this year, Lake Placid CEO Michael Lobsinger appeared before council indicating that he had formed a partnership with Dr. Karim Nasser and that financing had been secured to complete the $200 million dollar River Landing Village previously approved by council.
In mid-April, council agreed to enter into negotiations with Lake Placid subject to an independent audit to ensure that adequate financing was in place to complete the project.
Council will formally vote to approve the sale at the June 14 council meeting after hearing from anyone who might be opposed to the sale. Lobsinger indicates that he’s “ready to move dirt in June or July” and believes that the project can be completed in 36-months.
Read more from David Hutton’s report here.
I’m always happy to answer your Saskatoon real estate questions. All of my contact info is here. Please feel free to call or email.
Norm Fisher
Royal LePage Saskatoon Real Estate
10 comments so far. We'd love to hear your thoughts.
May 26th, 2010 at 10:50 AM
I sure hope this sale goes through and it’s not voted down. I just wonder how the price of a parcel of land shot up more than double the price in just one year…something stinks if you ask me. Lets hope that this goes through and we can have an addition to the riverfront that’s more than what’s already been done and hope that the ‘greed’ of the people voting on this don’t vote it down because ‘we could get more money for it if we wait’…
May 26th, 2010 at 8:29 PM
Surprising that these high rolling partners can’t even pay market value for the land under their hotel. I’m not really sure why all the other taxpayers should subsidize their white elephant, other then to stroke what the mayor and the developer hope will be their legacy. I highly doubt that Nassir’s portfolio of sad sack Saskatoon’s property’s will secure financing for this projects completion
The citys due dligence will certainly come into question when this project stalls, again.I did enjoy reading however about Nassir’s unasuming lifestyle. His wife driving the 20 year old Toyota and them living in the bungalow with orange shag carpet and glonoliom in less then new condition in the kitchen. Perhaps his plan was to save a life times worth of pennies to build a trophy type of monument to himself.
Oh by the way Norm, do you have spell check on your blog
May 26th, 2010 at 9:46 PM
Sorry, I just had to put this on.
Real estate downfall parody.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNmcf4Y3lGM
May 26th, 2010 at 9:46 PM
Have I mishspeld somthin or r u pokin fun at yerself?
Rick, I think it would be unusual for a developer to pay full pop for land for any of these projects. Isn’t this fairly typical? Assuming they can get the job done, and I trust that we’ll get good info from the auditor, this project brings a lot of value to taxpayers. The city is giving five year tax breaks for condo conversions. Different story if there’s some kind of line up at council on the 14th with people wanting to pay more, but failing that, the market seems to be suggesting that the land these guys are willing to buy is the white elephant. Maybe we’re lucky to get $5 million and a whack of property taxes?
May 26th, 2010 at 11:02 PM
Right Norm, the spell check enquiry is for meself. Regarding River Landing, if everything from start to finish to ongoing profitabllity goes exactly as planned, then you probably are right Norm. But don’t you think your being a tad bit overly optimistic considering this projects past track record. There has been countless mega projects planned for Saskatoon that never happened, river landing would’nt be the first. Further if we already don’t have a high enough tax base to support ourselves building more boondogles are not going to help much. Any way we have a couple of hotels on the river bank and I don’t know do we really need another.
May 28th, 2010 at 3:21 PM
As Regina announces an equally grand hotel/condo/business tower/landmark… to be completed sooner
So what’s that downtown tower wise?
Regina 10 to Saskatoon 1 (if Saskatoon ever builds this?)
Now who has a “real” big city down town?
May 28th, 2010 at 3:24 PM
rick “There has been countless mega projects planned for Saskatoon that never happened”
Kind of reminds me of Springfield and its Monorail…
No wonder Saskatoon wins in self reported contests (recent literacy/involvement survey) versus objective (actual standardized scores on math/english/science) tests
Of course by the time results of grand predictions, plans fall apart, Saskatoon is already onto the next mega project…. go new bridge!!
May 29th, 2010 at 2:36 PM
New Regina tower
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/saskatchewan/story/2010/05/25/sk-regina-building-1005.html
May 29th, 2010 at 11:18 PM
Would be hilarious if Regina got its brand new super tower built before Saskatoon’s often delayed River Landing equivalent!
Why give a property tax break for conversions?
Isn’t that why there’s such a rental shortage in Saskatoon?
June 5th, 2010 at 12:14 AM
What’s truly hilarious is to hear the Regina crowd pipe up on here. Too bad they don’t realize that these towers won’t translate into population gains on Saskatoon. Too bad their towers won’t improve the dead area that is downtown Regina’s street-level and store fronts. I’ll take Saskatoon’s vibrant downtown with its restaurants, stores, nightlife and arts scene, which Regina can’t come close to.
River Landing will be much more than the Capital Point project. It will be the first of its kind to have a common area between the buildings – plus, it’s just as, if not more, grand looking, with a much better view (but, really, for the Regina tower to have a better view, they would need to move it to Saskatoon).
Just for the record, the condos at River Landing will be Saskatoon’s 11th tower over 200 feet. When Regina’s two new towers are complete, they will have eight.