New Development in Curtis Park, Sacramento

Yeah, I know what you were hoping for… an article about Curtis Park rail yard development. Sorry not on this one – no chit chat about gas station wars and dollar stores. Instead I’m inviting you to follow my own development experience as I build out two houses. I hope to post some thoughts on the grueling process of splitting the lot / sub-dividing the parcel map. Could be educational to some – loads of learning from my mistakes and experience. I’ll be talking about the ins and outs of the scope of work, contracting, and architectural plans. I’d love some feedback on the design elements when we get to the interior (yeah, everyone loves the interior – this is the sexy part). Ultimately, these babies will be sold and I will be high-fiving my contractor and business partner. Welcome to my housing development journey.

Brief background

If you live in the area, you can check out the progress on 5th Ave., highway 99 frontage road, and Portola Alley. I bought the house on 5th Ave. in 2008 and got the approval to subdivide the parcel later that year into 3 lots (original house sits on one, leaving 2 to build on). Oh yes, it came with conditions. I figured a budget of $25,000 to do curb and gutter work and maybe a few other things. The City gave me a laundry list of improvements that got bid out between $100,000-125,000 – Yikes! That killed the deal quickly. So for the next six years I paid a portion of the property taxes and kept the weeds down.

Fast forward to 2014… I saw a house sell for a decent price on the alley and knew it was time to build. I got a contractor on board to share the project and do the work at cost (cutting the improvement work cost more than half).

Contact me if you want to discuss the boring, but essential ins and outs of engineering, special use permits, bonding, traffic plans, dealing with the City/fighting with the City (everyone has their war stories), utilities, etc.

We’ve begun improvement work – manholes, water main, sewer main, fire hydrant, and much more! At the same time I’ve got an architect putting plans together and submitting to the Design Review Board. In addition, I just got bids from five structural engineers and Title 24 bids. Yay, getting serious.