The Saint Paul Condo Blog

The Commerce Building celebrated its Grand Opening on Monday.  The building has been operating since June as an apartment building, but Monday was the big party.  They completed "phase 1" of the building which consisted of 55 apartments on floors 7-12.  Phase 2 with complete the lower portion of the building with an additional 45 units and a fitness center, movie room, business center, and more.

The Commerce building was partly financed by tax credits, meaning any perspective tenant needs to meet certain financial requirements (read: you can't make too much money).  After talking with the building manager for a little while, I started to wonder how people afford the rent they were asking with the caps that are in place.  A single person can make nor more than $33k a year.  A two person household = $38k, three people was $42k I believe.  OK, so I can see a single person paying $875 for an apartment, but $1075 a month for a two bedroom I just don't see how it's possible?  That seems like a really high rental amount based on a two or three person household income caps.

Ok, enough of that!  On to the good stuff.  I was really impressed with the finishes of the apartments; nice cabinets, terrazzo floors, and District Energy for heating and cooling, and really solid doors (no hollow core here!).  When the real estate market corrects, look for this on the conversion list.