Lebanon’s housing supply is growing constrained as sewer system upgrades delay development and neighboring Dartmouth College looks to expand. Photo courtesy of Dartmouth College.
The city of Lebanon is flush with four multifamily development proposals that could add nearly 900 badly needed housing units to the area, but there’s something holding three of the projects up: Lack of sewer capacity.
Lebanon, which is next to Hanover – home of Dartmouth College – currently has a moratorium on most major development projects until it finishes sewer-system upgrades that are expected to vastly expand the system’s capacity to treat wastewater.
If all goes well, the bulk of the sewer work should be completed by early 2020, more than doubling the system’s treatment capacity and theoretically opening the way for private developers and Dartmouth College to proceed with major multifamily housing projects in Lebanon.
Shaun Mulholland, city manager in Lebanon, stressed that there’s “no guarantee” all the projects will be approved by the city, assuming the building moratorium is lifted after the sewer work is completed early next year. He noted that there are some in the city opposed to further development in general in Lebanon, a city of 13,500 residents.
Still, Mulholland also noted there’s a feeling among many others that the city is in “dire need” of more housing for those working at the area’s largest employers, including Dartmouth College, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Hypertherm Inc. and other firms and institutions.
“There’s certainly a recognition out there that we need more affordable housing,” Mulholland said.
And developers are eager to provide more housing, all of it just south of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, the area’s largest employer that’s reportedly eyeing its own expansion of beds at its facility.
‘Clearly a Need for More Housing’
Dartmouth College has signaled (though not officially filed) its desire to build 300 graduate-student housing units on Mount Support Road.
Meanwhile, Braverman Co., run by businessman Ken Braverman, has proposed 98 new units on Mount Support Road; Saxon Partners of Massachusetts has proposed a 250-unit apartment complex; and developer Jay Campion has presented plans for a 250-unit condominium complex, dubbed “Signal Park,” according to published reports and city officials. The Signal Park project envisions having its own heating, power and wastewater treatment facilities, thus technically not needing to tap into the city’s sewer system, though the proposal has yet to be approved.
“There’s clearly a need for more housing,” said Chip Brown of Brown Commercial Realty LLC, a Hanover commercial real estate brokerage and advisory firm that’s representing Saxon Partners. “Employment has expanded in the area, but housing hasn’t really kept up.”
Mulholland, Brown and others note that studies have shown how housing supply and demand in the area are out of balance in general, thus driving up prices, forcing many workers to live 15 minutes or more outside the city and clogging area roadways in mornings and evenings.
Lori Shipulski, regional manager at Four Seasons Sotheby’s International, said rent prices are “getting impossible” for many people in the area, with some two-bedroom/two-bathroom units going for $2,000 to $2,500. Some Dartmouth graduate students are so shocked at rental prices, they’ve opted to purchase homes or condos in Lebanon, even though they may intend to stay in the area for only a few years, she said.
Single-family home prices, meanwhile, have also jumped over the past two years in Lebanon, to $291,000 year-to-date through May from $246,000 during the same period in 2017, according to data from data analytics firm The Warren Group, publisher of The Registry Review.
Data shows recent wild swings in condo prices, jumping to $294,000 during the first five months of 2018, only to settle back down to $180,000 through the first five months of 2019.
Demand for ‘Nicer and Newer’ Rentals
David Donegan, a partner at Synder Donegan Real Estate Group, said many of today’s tenants are demanding “nicer and newer” rental units – and the supply just isn’t there for such housing. “We just need new housing stock in general,” he said.
While major multifamily projects are being held up due to the city’s sewer-capacity problem, there is some new construction going on in Lebanon, including the “Treetops at Etna Road,” a 75-unit condo development that was permitted years ago, said Shipulski, whose Four Seasons Sotheby’s International is representing the development.
Treetops, which is expected to be finished later this year or early next year, is now advertising a one-bedroom/one-bathroom condo for $290,000 and a new two-bedroom/two-bathroom condo for $415,000, among other units for sale in online listings. Those prices are significantly more than last year’s median $195,000 price for condos in Lebanon, according to data.
But Shipulski and others said the additional units from Treetops, as well as from other recent housing developments, simply isn’t enough to meet demand.
“With the college and the hospital growing and employing so many, there’s a constant struggle for more workforce housing,” Shipulski said. “We definitely could use more.”
