Pool & Gym now open

The amenities area at 20 Hindmarsh Square has just opened for the residents. As we blogged earlier, these facilities aren't actually located in the apartment building but are in the adjoining Crowne Plaza 5 star hotel run by the Intercontinental group. However, they are so easily accessible via a seamless crossover entrance that you can't even tell that you've stepped next door! The Hotel itself looks like it is still a few weeks from completion.

The lap pool and spa look very inviting, and the sauna and steam room are top class. The gymnasium is seriously equipped for those into health, fitness and wellness.

Shrinking Apartments

For the best City and North Adelaide locations, a brand new apartment in our best buildings sells for $7,000 to $8,000 per square metre off-the-plan. That means a 110 square metre 2 bedroom 2 bathroom pad with a carpark is $770,000 to $880,000. This cuts out many younger buyers, even though city living might be more suited to their study/work/play lifestyle than moving out to the "burbs" at their age.

A new generation of studio apartments may be the answer to this growing market. The current crop is aimed at international students. With no on-site carparks, and sized at around 28 square metres, they can be sold off-the-plan for $179,500 or up to $195,000 when completed and fully furnished.

However, international students aren't the only young people who want to live in the city. We think a high quality building with studio, 1 bed and 2 bed apartments sized at 35 to 65 square metres (exclusive of balconies) and marketed at $240,000 to $520,000 would be a sell out.

The key is a powerful location, clever design and great amenities including the usual lap pool, gym, common lounge and roof deck. The studios would have fold down beds and kitchen tables that pull off the wall as well as finishes and fixtures of a high quality.

This would appeal to the "lock and leave" mentality of many younger buyers who are looking for apartments which function as a sleeping place only. The rest of their 'living' occurs elsewhere in the city, which they can easily access without a car because they are in close proximity to their employment and social activities.

Underwater

A number of houses in Southern Queensland are literally underwater at the moment, with torrential rains bringing huge floods. But we've just discovered that a lot of houses in the United States are underwater in a different way.

We had visitors last weekend from Reno in Nevada, a state with a population of around 2.7 million. Beth is a broker with Morgan Stanley and she commutes to the adjoining state of California to work at her office in San Francisco. Nevada and California, along with Arizona, Florida and Michigan are the states hardest hit by the housing bust in America.

After she arrived on the Diamond Princess cruise boat, we showed Beth around our fair city and our various house styles - villas, bungalows, cottages and in-fill townhouse developments. She mentioned how so many houses in Nevada were "underwater" and explained that this is the term realtors and bankers use to indicate that the size of the mortgage is higher than the value of the home. The term we use is here is "negative equity".

Nevada has 13% unemployment and 70% of its homeowners with a mortgage are "underwater", so the problem is enormous. Having no job and being "underwater" are the 2 biggest drivers of foreclosure and handing the house keys back to the bank.