Loyola Village Condominiums Taking Shape
With construction well underway and a new director and business manager hired to oversee the sales, leasing, and financing of the project, Loyola Village is getting closer to welcoming its first occupants.
Construction of the 136-unit condominium complex began in spring 2000 on Lone Mountain along Anza Street. The project should be completed by Jan.1, 2002, but some units are expected to be ready for occupancy this year. Actual move-in dates will depend on when all City approvals are received. Initially, some townhouses were expected to be ready this summer, but that has been pushed back because the City will not issue the necessary occupancy permits until emergency access roads and other infrastructure are complete.
The units will range in size from an approximately 600-square-foot studio to a 1,400- square-foot townhouse. Units will have wall-to-wall carpet, maple finishes, Corian counters, and double-insulated walls for extra privacy. Some townhouse units will also have fireplaces, balconies, and washers and dryers. An underground parking garage will provide one parking space per unit.
Kathleen Freitag, the new director of faculty and staff housing, will hold informational meetings across campus in the coming weeks to address questions of pricing, purchase, priority, layouts, finishes, and terms of occupancy. She also plans to give tours of the project after hours beginning in the summer, construction safety conditions permitting.
Freitag began her full time position May 1. She earned her MBA from USF in 1986, and has worked for 10 years in the residential real estate market. She will focus on the marketing, promotion, and coordination of the project. Rich Waters, a 1954 USF graduate, was hired to assist faculty and staff with the financing of individual units. Waters comes to USF from a 40-year career in banking.
Although the rental and purchase prices for Loyola Village are not yet available, “the goal of the project is to provide faculty and staff with more affordable ownership opportunities than what is currently available in the San Francisco market,” said Charlie Cross, acting vice president of business and finance. Pricing will be available in late May, once the university receives approval of the project from the California Department of Real Estate. The Department of Real Estate must approve the subdivision map for Loyola Village before pricing is released, Cross said. A committee of faculty and staff will review final pricing.
One of the most daunting challenges USF faces in recruiting and retaining candidates for faculty and top administrative posts is the skyrocketing cost of housing in the Bay Area, Cross said. The USF Board of Trustees approved the Loyola Village project as an effort to address this challenge. With that in mind, faculty and “key staff” members will have priority in purchasing and/or renting the units, Cross said.
In particular, priority will be given first to new and newly tenured faculty, professional librarians, and executive officers, followed by faculty recommended by their dean and the provost, and staff recommended by their vice president, dean, and the provost. Units still available after interested people in these categories have been given priority will be available for rent in the following order of priority: faculty with full-time renewable term appointments, graduate students, university employees other than students, faculty from other institutions, visiting scholars, and undergraduate students. For information about Loyola Village, contact Freitag at (415) 422-2030, or at freitag@usfca.edu, or Waters at (415) 422-2324 or at waters@usfca.edu.
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