{"id":2453191,"date":"2020-01-13T22:32:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-14T05:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/10m-rent-control-deal-falls-through-for-city-of-aspen\/"},"modified":"2020-01-14T11:06:23","modified_gmt":"2020-01-14T18:06:23","slug":"10m-rent-control-deal-falls-through-for-city-of-aspen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/10m-rent-control-deal-falls-through-for-city-of-aspen\/","title":{"rendered":"$10M rent control deal falls through for city of Aspen"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A $10 million deal has fallen through between the developer of the Centennial housing complex and the city of Aspen that had the municipal government buying the deed restrictions on 143 apartments in perpetuity, effectively limiting rent prices.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody worked in good faith but we just couldn\u2019t get it done,\u201d Sam Brown, general partner in Centennial Aspen II Limited Partnership, the owner of the complex, said on Monday. \u201cIt\u2019s a damn shame.\u201d<\/p>\n

Negotiations<\/a> stalled out in late December when a new buyer of the complex, who is set to close in the next 45 days, could not agree to the city\u2019s terms regarding a stipulation in the ownership agreement.<\/p>\n

Brown\u2019s group, which developed Centennial in the 1980s, has the ability as landlord to regulate the rent on the complex\u2019s overall square footage, which allows for some tenants to pay more or less based on ownership\u2019s needs.<\/p>\n

That flexibility is being passed onto the buyer, and Aspen City Council had concerns about the potential abuse of power by an unknown entity, according to Chris Everson, the city\u2019s affordable housing manager.<\/p>\n

Brown said the deadline was approaching for his deal with the buyer and it was a point they were unwilling to budge on.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the buyer\u2019s perspective they looked at what the city wanted and they said, \u2018What you are asking jeopardizes our ability to finance the deal,\u2019\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe just couldn\u2019t find that sweet spot.\u201d<\/p>\n

After a Dec. 19 meeting between city staff and Brown, Everson said the government was waiting for a counterproposal.<\/p>\n

Instead, Brown sent a notice of termination on the purchase contract.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like we dropped the ball because we left the ball in his court,\u201d Everson said Monday. \u201cI do feel like it was a lost opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

But at the same time, City Council\u2019s concerns were addressed, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt we were being reasonable by looking at the how the rents were managed,\u201d Everson said.<\/p>\n

If the sale of the property goes through, the buyer will take on Centennial\u2019s conditions for approval from the mid-1980s, which call for a lifting of the deed restriction on the units.<\/p>\n

How much the owner can charge for rent expires at the end of the 21st year after the death of the last member of the Pitkin Board of County Commissioners who approved the development, which is 72-year-old Old Snowmass resident Michael Kinsley.<\/p>\n

Brown, who was championing the city buying the deed restrictions, said he\u2019s \u201ccrushed\u201d that he wasn\u2019t able to make it happen.<\/p>\n

He said while the real estate deal is more lucrative to him with Centennial rentals eventually going to the free market, he would have rather seen the city be in control of the rents.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was not an economic issue but a matter of public policy,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

Several years ago, Brown offered the city the chance to buy the property for $60 million, and recently reduced that to $50 million, but the municipal government declined.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are under contract for more than what we offered the city,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Brown added that the buyer is interested in working with the city on the deed restriction in the future.<\/p>\n

Brown declined to reveal the identity of the buyer but has said in the past that it is a company that specializes in owning and managing affordable housing.<\/p>\n

The city\u2019s interest in buying Centennial\u2019s deed restriction in perpetuity was prompted by Brown\u2019s group shopping the property to prospective buyers.<\/p>\n

City Council members have said that $10 million is a small price to pay when assuming market forces will continue to drive up costs.<\/p>\n

csackariason@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A $10 million deal has fallen through between the developer of the Centennial housing complex and the city of Aspen that had the municipal government buying the deed restrictions on 143 apartments in perpetuity, effectively limiting rent prices. \u201cEverybody worked in good faith but we just couldn\u2019t get it done,\u201d Sam Brown, general partner in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2453191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-18 20:59:43","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2453191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2453191"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2453191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2453221,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2453191\/revisions\/2453221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2453191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2453191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2453191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}