Condo Fever Hits Vegas, Baby

The condominium craze raging through Las Vegas, Nevada, is pushing the prices for once modest homes and land through the roof, the Houston Chronicle reports.

Manuel Corchuelo, a Colombian immigrant and former catering waiter, bought a 700-square foot home just off the famed Las Vegas strip for $30,000 in 1978. Now his modest WWII-era dwelling is nestled snugly amidst 93 luxury condominium projects - totaling 175 towers and representing 10,000 units - making Corchuelo a millionaire-in-waiting. Residing one block off Las Vegas Boulevard, and across the street from the future “Allure,” a 41-story luxury complex under construction, the house is on the market for $1.2 million.

Talk about a return on an investment.

It’s all a distant memory that the very same block was once home to card dealers and strippers, or that in the 1980s, it became a neighborhood of rampant prostitution and crime. Now, the streets are lined with well-kept homes, hotels and public housing - with speculators and real estate agents cruising the place as frequently as the residents. In 2000, Las Vegas lifted its longstanding height and parking restrictions in an effort to lure developmers and boost the area’s economy.

It worked.

• The cost of a vacant acre in the Las Vegas vicinity is now $601,600 — an increase of 88 percent over last year.
• Developers dream of Vegas’ “Manhattanization,” or “verticality” instead of sprawl, and are courting out-of-towners as investors and residents. Approximately 85 percent of condo buyers are non-Nevada residents / investors, according to recent data.

While some real estate agents in the area doubt that Corchuelo will receive his asking price (a house similar to his and on the same block recently went for $520,000), he is banking on the market rising as quickly as the towers around him. Developers already covet his property, and it may become a matter of who can hold out the longest. No matter what happens, his case is indicative of just how quickly Las Vegas’ urban revitalization is transpiring - perhaps even more quickly than the Florida real estate condo craze.