NEW CONDOS IN Center City and Manayunk are nothing new. It is new, however, to find this trendy product in West Mount Airy. It’s even more of an oddity on Germantown Avenue.

Mt. Airy USA held an open house at Winston Commons (http://www.winstoncommons.com), on Germantown Avenue at Phil Elena Street, recently to show off the buildings - five two-bedroom, two-bath and a single one-bedroom, one-bath unit - for the first time.

The condo project has been at least four years in the making. It’s no easy feat for a non-profit community development corporation to round up $4 million in financing for a purely market-rate project.

Mt. Airy USA executive director Farah Jimenez gathered a veritable village of financial sources to back her plan to convert the historic Victorian building into a mix of residential and retail. Jimenez believes the condo development will be a better catalyst for revitalization of Germantown Avenue.

The challenge now is to find buyers in a real estate market that has slowed significantly from the frenetic pace of four years ago. Jimenez came up with the idea of getting local artisans and merchants to contribute furnishings and art work to decorated two of the units.

Two of the condos are furnished with colorful whimsical chairs and tables handcrafted by Charles Todd, an antique Chinese chest from Material culture, and eclectic lighting by designer Tyson Boles, a Brooklyn, N.Y., transplant who has a studio on Germantown Avenue. Diane Bryman Accents of Chestnut Hill and other vendors also contributed accessories.

Winston Commons is one of a handful of new or substantially new developments that provide homeownership opportunities for households whose income is just a little too much to qualify for government subsidized programs, but not enough to afford the bulk of the privately built condos and townhouses going up around the city. These are the city’s teachers, nurses, firemen, police officers, middle managers and technicians whose annual salaries fall between $60,000 and $90,000.

It is a difficult market for which to build given the high labor costs and recent run-ups in material costs, but here are three other projects where the price may be just right for you.

If Mount Airy is too far removed from the bright lights of Center City, check out Spring Arts Point, a complex of townhouse and condominium flats between Green and Wallace streets at 10th. (http://springartspoint.com). New Urban Ventures hopes to complete its first models in time for the spring home-buying frenzy. The three-bedroom, 2 A1 2- bath townhouses ($339,000 to $449,000) have rear yards and parking spaces. Parking also is provided for the one- and two-bedroom condo flats ($229,000 to $455,000), which are in three-story buildings.

Sherman is hoping most of his buyers will be able to ditch their cars altogether.

Spring Arts Point is located on a major bus route and for the hardier, a 15-minute walk to Broad and Market streets. The builder is partnering with Philly Car Share which will provide fuel efficient rental cars on the premises for residents to use when they absolutely have to have a personal ride.

‘It goes to your approach to development as a whole and mitigating sprawl,’ Sherman said. ‘Also, eliminating the need to own a car frees up that money to buy more house or go on vacation or to eat out more.’

Just west of Broad Street at 17th and Poplar streets, fledgling developer Maleda Berhane is offering plenty of bang for the buck for the six loft-style condos in The Exchange (http://www.olivexchange.com) , a former Bell Atlantic switching station.

The one- and two-bedroom condos at the Exchange feature 17-foot ceilings with prices ranging from $219,900 to $380,000. The penthouse units on the fourth floor are bi-level with huge skylights.

All feature bamboo floors, stone counters, the ubiquitous stainless appliances and gated off-street parking.

Francisville is a tough, hardscrabble neighborhood on the rebound.

‘There is a ton of development going on in the neighborhood, everything from your single-family renovations to new construction to large-scale multi-family,’ said Berhane, who also works as a sales agent for Coldwell Banker broker Julie Welker. ‘It’s priced really low right now because it is the pioneer investor stage, but we’re starting to see a lot of people who are priced out of the Center City market come north.’

A mile farther west, at 31st Street and Girard Avenue, Westrum Development has nearly finished the first 90 townhouses in Brewerytown Square. The development eventually will consist of more than 700 units between Girard Avenue and Oxford Street. The starting price for a two-bedroom, two-bath townhouse at Brewerytown Square (http://www.westrum.

com) is $269,900 for a perimeter unit and $415,000 for a courtyard unit.

‘I have coined the phrase that ‘We don’t build affordable housing, we build housing people can afford,’ ‘ company CEO John Westrum quipped.

‘We have programs now that can put you into a home for $1,500 to $1,800 a month.’

Source:

http://www.topix.net/content/kri/1346394983349124299133539299890065766742