By PETER HUSSMANN
An Urbandale couple's plan to build seven duplexes on properties they purchased from the city in August lead building permit activity in September and marked the largest monthly value for new residential construction in Newton since February 2006.
Kading Properties, owned by Rick and Mary Kading, according to Iowa Secretary of State documents, paid $44,000 for the seven properties in the 700 block of First Street South and South Eighth Avenue West that the city had purchased under its Dangerous and Dilapidated Buildings Program two years before. The city paid a total of $99,870 for eight properties and plus approximately $5,000 a piece last year to tear down and dispose of each property. One city-owned property remains unsold.
Newton Community Development Director Bryan Friedman told council members at the time the properties were sold that the plan for the area included seven architecturally distinct duplexes with a total value of at least $770,000. However, the permit value recorded by the city in its September construction report records the value at $1,085,000.
The properties are eligible for the city's five-year tax abatement program - two years at 100 percent abatement and three years of 50 percent abatement. City officials said the new revenues from the property could later be earmarked to replenish the D&D fund, though no decision has been made.
The permit value for the seven Kading properties is the highest since $1.2 million in value was recorded in February 2006. For the whole year 2006, new residential construction permit values totalled $1.88 million.
Year-to-date in 2009, Newton has recorded a total of $1.6 million in new residential construction, more than the totals of the previous two years. Last month, a new residential construction permit valued at more than $500,000 marked the first activity in the category in the past eight months.
Other permit valuations included $90,000 in non-residential remodeling, $60,000 in new non-residential structures (A to Z Mini Storage), $19,000 for residential garages/sheds and $12,000 in residential remodeling for a monthly total of approximately $1.3 million.
Through September, the city has recorded nearly $7.3 million in total building permit valuations.
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