Conversions come at a cost

Tenants in a bind when their apartments turn condo:

“It was just a horrible place to be, with constant noise, construction and hordes of prospective buyers traipsing through,” said Reynolds, 32, a legal assistant at a Belltown law firm.

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Reynolds isn’t alone in feeling the sting of Seattle’s condo-conversion craze. In the first six months of this year, 1,162 Seattle apartments have become condos or are headed for conversion, a pace that would far exceed last year’s total of 1,551 conversions.

I had friends at what is now Plaza Del Sol who got kicked out. And not because they couldn’t afford to buy their unit, they just didn’t think it was worth paying what they were asking as they had complaints about the buildings proximity to the police and fire stations and the noise separation in the building.

And there really are a lot of conversions. The other night I was driving up on 16th on Capitol Hill and passed by two conversions that haven’t done any major marketing put apparently are close to being sold out. I’m sure the city is filled with lots of these mini-conversions.

Also, The Stranger actually ran a very similar story about a year ago, Forced Out.