Housing permits hit 17-year high in Carson City

CARSON CITY, Nev. — Carson City issued the most building permits for houses in 2019 since 2002, and more residential construction is on the way.

A plan to build 37 two-story, three-bedroom detached houses on 5.5 acres on Emerson Drive, between College Parkway and the I-580 bypass, is going to the Planning Commission this month, as is an 81-unit apartment project on Brown Street on 2.78 acres recently sold by the city to Dwight and Sandra Millard.

The Emerson Drive Cottages plan was already discussed at the Board of Supervisors' first meeting of the year because the project applicant, John Krmpotic, KLS Planning, is requesting a municipal code change that would allow tandem parking to count toward required parking.

The development's house design includes a two-car, tandem garage. The board agreed, and heard the first reading of an ordinance which will allow it with a special use permit.

If developed, those projects will join a handful of other developments already under construction, including three projects on Little Lane between Saliman Road and Roop Street — Arbor Villas, consisting of 147 attached single-family townhomes; Little Lane Village, a project for 149, two- and three-story single-family houses; and a recently approved plan for an unnamed project to build 126 apartments.

Mills Landing comprising 105 two-story, single-family attached homes on 7.9 acres between Long and William streets, which broke ground in 2017, is still under construction, and the long-delayed Jackson Village, 41 single-family homes on 3.66 acres on Eagle Lane, is being built.

In addition, both Schulz Ranch and Silver Oak, two established developments, are in new phases of construction. And plans for Andersen Ranch, which go to the supervisors this week, and Lompa Ranch, which has several approved projects, but no building permits have been issued for any of those projects.

And there are condos on the drawing board, including Silver Crest Condominiums, a project to build 51 condos on Roland Street that was recently approved by the supervisors, as well other multifamily projects such as Carson Hills Apartments, the 370-unit Curry Street Tanamera Construction project that is well underway.

The Carson Hills project pushed residential building permits to an all-time high in 2018, to 567 permits, when the builder pulled all the permits at the end of the year to ensure construction would move forward in 2019. Carson City's growth management ordinance places an annual limit on building permits and in 2019 the limit was 659 units, which includes both single- and multifamily residences.

But, in terms of single-family houses, last year recorded the most permits in 17 years.

In 2019, there were 155 building permits for single-family detached and 58 permits for attached, for a total of 213 units. That's up from 134 detached and 40 attached, a total of 174, in 2018, and 120, consisting of 111 detached and nine attached, in 2017. In 2002, there were 289 permits, 283 of them for detached houses.

Last year, 62 permits were issued for multifamily units and three for duplexes for a total of 279 residential building permits.

The total valuations of those permits was $93 million, up from $63 million in 2018. Total building permit valuations, including commercial and public projects, was $146.35 million, up from $102.4 million the year before.