Real estate: Cisneros touts his company’s Boulder condo project

Mike Cote //November 1, 2009//

Real estate: Cisneros touts his company’s Boulder condo project

Mike Cote //November 1, 2009//

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Former HUD chief Henry Cisneros recently visited Boulder to tout the Peloton, a mixed-use development his company is helping to finance – a $150 million project that increased sales recently by slashing prices.

Cisneros, who served as secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development in the Clinton administration, operates CityView, an institutional investment firm based in Los Angeles that focuses on urban communities. It’s working with developer Bancroft Capital.
The first phase of the 10-acre development, built on the campus of defunct data storage company Exabyte, includes 190 luxury condominiums plus four retail spaces, two restaurants, a community center and a dog park.

The development is a few blocks from the Twenty Ninth Street shopping center and along a bus route.

Homes start at $229,000 and top out in the $570,000 range, though one penthouse is priced at $2.2 million. Nineteen affordable units – part of a 20 percent requirement by the city of Boulder – start at $88,000. In July, the developers cut prices as much as $100,000.

During a press conference in October, Cisneros said CityView “focuses on a unique aspect of the real estate spectrum, which is homes in urban areas for sale at prices working families can afford.”

Peter Cushman, senior vice president at Bancroft Capital, acknowledged the tough market but said activity has picked up over the past few months.

“A lot of our sales recently have been first-time buyers who didn’t previously think they’d be able to own a home,” he said, referring to an $8,000 federal tax credit put in place to spur home sales. “We were able to stimulate a lot of activity this summer by lowering our prices slightly.”

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