Napa luxury garage condo project attracts buyers
Construction has wrapped on the first phase of a south Napa self-storage facility aimed at local vintners and collectors of luxury art and vehicles, and about half the newly built commercial condominiums already are reserved.
Twenty-four of the 43 units in the first three buildings finished at the Napa Vault project in October already have been reserved, according to the development’s website. Altogether, the project, located at 1055 Soscol Ferry Road just southwest of the intersection of Highway 29 and the Napa Vallejo Highway, is approved for 124 units in 11 buildings plus a clubhouse.
Most of the buyers are local vintners looking to store their libraries or high-end automobiles, according to Laura Duffy, who leads the JLL leasing team for the project
“I’m blown away by the number of high-end car collectors in the area who have run out of space at home in the garage,” Duffy said.
The units are designed to range in size from 768 (16 feet by 48 feet) to 2,000 square feet and have a 24-foot interior clear height. Most have around 1,000 square feet and widths of 20 or 24 feet. And adjacent units can be combined for spaces of up to 5,000 square feet.
Prices in phase 1 currently range from $324,000 to $428,000.
Grading has begun on phase 2, which will be another 40 units in four buildings. Those units are expected to be ready for occupancy by this time next year, Duffy said.
The developer is Storage Tech Inc., a Napa-based venture started in 2019 by Peter Bedford. He developed Napa Valley Corporate Park in the 1980s before he retired as top executive of Bedford Property Investors, a publicly traded real estate investment trust that built and operated 44 million square feet of office and industrial space in Western states.
These units are known in the self-storage industry as garage condos, considered the top end of the RV storage business. The facilities range from open lots to carport lots to enclosed rentals to for-sale units large enough for 40-foot motorcoaches plus amenities such as air-conditioning, plumbing and connections for television and data.
Demand for storage spaces in general is rising both from a resurgence in RV travel by a hotel-wary public in the pandemic plus a need for excess space to store home and business items during transitions out of urban areas or company downsizing of office space, according to Forbes and the RV Industry Association.
A recent study from Go RVing found that 11.2 million households now own an RV, up 26% in the past 10 years and 62% in the last two decades. The RV trade group noted in the survey results that nearly a quarter of current RV owners are younger than 35, and 84% of those younger owners plan to purchase a new RV in the next five years.
Descor Builders is the general contractor for the project.
Jeff Quackenbush covers wine, construction and real estate. Before the Business Journal, he wrote for Bay City News Service in San Francisco. He has a degree from Walla Walla University. Reach him at jquackenbush@busjrnl.com or 707-521-4256.
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Correction, Dec. 9, 2021: Descor Builders is the project general contractor, not Devcon Construction. Incorrect information was provided for the original story.
