It wasn’t that long ago that there were very few residents – and a limited number of places available to rent – in Jacksonville’s urban core.
But these days both the number of downtown residents and the number of apartment units are trending upward.
A few years after the city set a goal of 10,000 residents for downtown, that number now sits at 6,878, DIA CEO Lori Boyer told the Business Journal in an email.
And with several hundred more apartment units currently under construction, and more in planning phases, that 10,000 number could quickly be within reach.
In a sense, what you’re seeing is Jacksonville’s downtown apartment market “growing up,” said Cliff Taylor and Joe Ayers with CBRE.
An in-migration to the First Coast is bringing some people who are looking for the urban living experience–walkable to restaurants, nightlife and events.
Taylor and Ayers said the existing apartment developments in the city are showing strong occupancy numbers and significant rental rate increases, which shows potential developers that the numbers make sense to build more multifamily.
Taylor and Ayers said that rental rate growth in the downtown area for the trailing five months ranged from 9.2% to 30%, depending on the property.
“That really speaks to the growth of the city and the quality of the assets and the pent-up demand,” Taylor said. “But rent growth has been incredible across the market, not just downtown and not just for brand-new product.”
Taylor and Ayers said in addition to downtown multifamily projects already in the works, such the former River City Brewery site on the Southbank, they know of there are developers currently looking for sites in the urban core.
Altogether, the outlook seems bright for a downtown that usually lags behind other metros.
Taylor and Ayers said a similar push years ago for more residents in the urban core of Charlotte, N.C., over time led to massive demand for retail and other services, and ultimately helped office market since employers want to locate near where their employees live.
“The push to increase that resident count (in Jacksonville) will help everything else,” Ayers said. “It’s a really encouraging time for the city.”
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