I see Metro Loft has moved out of their office on 15th. Anyone know what the latest is on this group?
I heard they filed for bankruptcy and I hope it's true.
Quote from: Double A on July 13, 2009, 12:10:07 PM
I heard they filed for bankruptcy and I hope it's true.
Phone numbers are no longer working numbers.
But I ran a query on all Federal cases in the Northern District of Oklahoma and Metro Lofts was not listed no any associated companies as far as I could tell. The principles listed on their website have no recently filed bankruptcy either.
And why the hostility?
Quote from: cannon_fodder on July 13, 2009, 12:46:46 PM
Phone numbers are no longer working numbers.
But I ran a query on all Federal cases in the Northern District of Oklahoma and Metro Lofts was not listed no any associated companies as far as I could tell. The principles listed on their website have no recently filed bankruptcy either.
And why the hostility?
Isn't Metro Lofts a Houston company?
AAA is upset over some safety issues he saw, and also that he doesn't like the kind of construction they were doing (style, materials, etc)
I know they have several projects shut down and no sales signs on some that def. should have signs up. I am guessing there is a good chance they are in bankruptcy and the assets are tied up until things are sorted out. If this is the case there could be lots of units going to sheriff sale.
I had also heard however that they had secured some investors so they could have just thrown in the towel and lost the property to their backers.
I know someone on this board must have the full scoop though.
Quote from: sgrizzle on July 13, 2009, 02:07:35 PM
Isn't Metro Lofts a Houston company?
Oklahoma Secretary of State:
METRO LOFTS, LLC Foreign Limited Liability Company Legal
(RA) Registered Agent: DAILEY AMANDA
1506 E 14TH ST
TULSA, OK 74120
(RA) Effective Date: 8/22/2007
Perhaps you are correct. I do not have access to the Federal Bankruptcy Court in Houston. I attempted to contact the Registered Agent but the listed number was disconnected.
This is what happens when your lender cuts off your line of credit....And when you have a poor buisness model to go along with it.....
Prices on the remaining units should be affordable soon.
Real estate FAIL
(http://www.randomfunnypicture.com/pictures/1149fail-owned-resort-ad-fail.jpg)
We own a home constructed by the Metro folks, and yes it's on Cherry Street. The quality is not poor, in fact it's higher than most of the new homes built in South Tulsa and for the price we paid we get the mid-town village feel without a lawn and with neighbors that are hard to beat.
That's my qualifying statement.
Now, to address what it was like to work with the Metro folks. They were good at first and then they overextended themselves, placing less emphasis on customer service and due to the market had to layoff many of their skilled workers. They lost our support early into the process of building our home. Their service was bad, their product is great. For the folks that built our homes - we were impressed with the quality of lumber, siding and finishing product.
Metro's Problem - they lacked leadership and totally lacked a professional marketing plan. Their vision was stronger than their ability to carry it out.
What I can tell from our experience - they had a great community-building plan but they weren't the right group to see it from start to finish. We could sense this at the beginning of our relationship with them. We've recently learned that Arvest Bank now has control of some of their partially-constructed properties and after conversation with the project leaders at the bank we have learned that Arvest is interested in completing the unfinished units with the same regard to quality that was originally promised.
Knowing what we paid to own a 2,000 SF house on Cherry Street, along with many other neighbors paying the same, it's doubtful, GASPAR, that the bank would be willing to firesale the remaining units. I've hosted many people looking around for a home with modern amenities like ours and they are from out-of-town. The Texans are the most plentiful group, looking for a walkable neighborhood like Cherry Street and they don't wince at the pricetag of 250k ++ for what we have.
I doubt that any bank would undercut the market potential of a number of these foreclosed homes just to get out of them ... instead I believe we have the support of a business with a stronger marketing plan. Yeh, they shoot to make money, but why charge 180k when more than half the residents have paid more??
Splain if you disagree.
Has your unit flooded yet? I've heard about other units in the area they built that have.
Our unit had an issue with a downstairs sliding glass door that had clogged weep-holes, to be detailed with you. On the first big rain following our move-in date we had water all over our d/s floor. Amanda w/ Metro and Kara w/ Metro both chipped in to help us as did Millcreek. We learned the weep-holes on the sliders were clogged from the initial installation, cleaning and unplugging them worked. We've had NO leaks and no seepage.
So, in a word - no. We have no issues with leaks. Honestly, I was skeptical and thought we would see more issues than we have. All is dry and that is from last June up until this month ... thirteen months later.
So it did flood. I am not surprised. I heard a local architect who was working on their projects early on parted ways with them because they demanded the architect cut corners to get-r-done on the cheap.
BTW, you can desperately try to convince yourself otherwise, but the answer to my question is yes.
Right. It was a flood, of sorts, back in June 2008. Nowadays in 2009 we haven't seen a single issue. Not trying to dispute ya - but we live here and see nothing at all in the way of seeping water or any kind of leak. We have one neighbor that DOES have issue and that's one of six. And since it's not our house we have no hands-on knowledge.
Tell you one thing for sure, we wouldn't live elsewhere. Neighborhood is great. But so is most of Mid-Town.
Hope you don't have a bad story or friend / family with a bad story going on with a Metro development.
I've lived in the area most of my life. I grew up in Yorktown. My first apartment was a garage apartment in Swan Lake. I lived in an apartment for ten years in the area that the Metro Lofts decimated, until I couldn't stand to watch the destruction of a neighborhood I dearly loved any longer. I still live in Mid-town(Lewiston Gardens) where I bought a great home for a fraction of the price of one of those overpriced, mass produced, lowest cost, non-architecturally significant, equivalents of strip malls meet apartments complexes.
If the neighborhood is being re-populated by Texicans with more money than sense, I'm glad I left.
BTW, have you lived in mid-town all your life as your screen name suggests?
I like a few of the Metro lofts but most are pretty average, design wise. They remind me of a lot of the crap "contemporary" lofts and townhomes that have gone up in Houston for the past several years. Not quite as bad though as at least these don't have huge garages facing a sidewalk-less street like in Houston. I like the ones that face the street not the ones that face the inner concrete courtyard with garages. I'd like to see more like the LEED Platinum house Shelby Navarro designed, a duplex that faces the street with parking behind, or rowhomes like the ones at 18th & Carson.
Well Double A please don't find fault in this - but nope, I haven't lived in Midtown ALL my life ... started out in Claremore as a kiddo and as soon as I could move out (after attending University of Tulsa) that's when I became a midtown lifer, living only in midtown since I was old enough to start making my own living-area decisions.
As far as the comment about Texicans ... it's such an opinion I wouldn't expect from "our part of the world" in midtown. I love mid/downtown because of the friendly neighborly openness it fosters. And just in general I feel we should be more welcoming as a state instead of acting as negative evangelists judging by race or whatever other qualities. I love Oklahoma and don't find any fault with people wanting to relcoate from other states. But to each their own.
And about the neighborhood getting decimated. I know a lot of the neighbors really wished the slumlords and the folks living in those homes that were destroyed would've taken better care of them. I remember seeing one home lose a front porch due to ice and the owners never repaired it ... instead, a big ole broken porch leaned diagonally across the entry. Ever read "The Tipping Point" by Malcom Gladwell? He has a "broken window" theory that fits the situation nicely. Ignoring issues like a sagging front porch eventually leads to disregard for the area which in turns creates a hotbed for crime. BUT that's just my opinion from having been an outsider to Cherry Street as a resident and only seeing it as a restaurant / bar-goer for the past years.
Congrats on finding the place you did in Lewiston Gardens. Sounds like you've done very well and in a great area. We too will probably, at some point, move into a home instead of a condo; BUT at this point in our life we're digging the no-yard, walk to dinner and the farmer's market part of life. Again, to each their own.
Quote from: Double A on July 15, 2009, 01:03:53 AM
My first apartment was a garage apartment in Swan Lake. I lived in an apartment for ten years in the area that the Metro Lofts decimated, until I couldn't stand to watch the destruction of a neighborhood I dearly loved any longer.
I wondered where all your spite towards Metro came from. It seemed above your usual level of hostility. Most people consider the loss of those old homes a tragedy, but the blame rests on the tenants, landlords, or previous owners who rode them into such a condition that knockdowns were acceptable.
I for one, am happy that area is developing into a denser neighborhood.
MidTownLifer:
Welcome to the forums. I appreciate your first person input on this topic. DoubleAA has some good Tulsa knowledge, but is almost exclusively expressed negatively.
Doble A....
I think you are showing a substantial amount of control on the matter of Metro.
If....... all of those (lofts?) things go to others to sell. May begin to remind one of a film closings in Tulsa.
Cherry Street may have low cost rentals soon....
Why did they (multiple builders) build so many? Why do they all look so similar? Not a hater; but there are a lot of them.
Quote from: ARGUS on July 26, 2009, 10:29:50 PM
Why did they (multiple builders) build so many? Why do they all look so similar? Not a hater; but there are a lot of them.
? As compared to what? Do we have more or less of them compared to other cities our size? I have always thought we had pitifully few of that type of lifestyle/living/housing option. Is that because we are too small a city or dont attract as many people who like that type of home? Didnt seem that Tulsa was always that way, we used to offer quit a bit of whatever was "up to date and in fashion, even cutting edge". Have we lost that over time? Perhaps we have too few people who have the money to afford that type of living,,,(seems what we offer in this style is mostly of lesser quality compared to other cities like say Austin or Denver but I suppose that there are enough people in those cities who want and can afford nicer, so ours is the cheapo version). The very fact that you ask the question you have asked is kind of startling to me. I thought we had too few, and for whatever reason that was true, felt that was not a good thing.
As for "Why do they all look so similar" there seems to me to be as much variation in the buildings as many another neighborhood has. My neighborhood of ranch style homes could be said to look similar. The faux Tuscan neighborhoods out south, the 80s brown stone and wood neighborhoods I lived in during my high school years lol, Lortondale, etc.... Its just what people at the time like, or liked. Again whats odd is that in this instance there isnt really a whole neighborhood of them. Just a minor block wide strip and a smattering here and there. Let alone a whole neighborhood or several whole neighborhoods of them scattered around the city like the other time periods/styles I mentioned above and that many other cities have of this type. We just have a few. I actually find that disturbing. Whats next on this trajectory....? Nothing new, nothing contemporary (do a google image search of "contemporary house' and see what comes up,,, its this style) this is the contemporary style of the age, nothing modern? We cant get much less of a style and still say we have it lol.