- CEO of Houston’s Biggest Builder Lennar Corp. Seeing Slight “Pullback” in Higher End Housing Here, Taking a ‘Wait-and-See’ Approach To Local Growth Amid Oil Price Decline [Prime Property]
- More New Retail Expected in 2015 Than Anytime in Last 6 Years, Including 32 New Grocery Stores, Claims Wulfe & Co. [Houston Chronicle]
- Federal Government Moves To Seize 11 Properties in Southeast Houston, Huffman, and Channelview Connected to Human Trafficking [Click2Houston]
- Montgomery County Cities Complain About Groundwater Restrictions [Houston Chronicle]
- 2 Artists Removing Their Works from City Hall To Protest Treatment of Artist Whose GRB Commission Was Offered, then Withdrawn by Houston Arts Alliance [Glasstire]
- A Map of Household Income in Texas, Down to the Neighborhood, Based on the Latest Census Data [HBJ]
Photo of the Menil Collection: Bill Barfield via Swamplot Flickr Pool
Headlines
4 new HEBs? Wonder where they are going. Crossing my fingers for EaDo
Whoever created the map that shows people living in best neighborhoods in town make the most money must be promoted from Captain Obvious to Admiral Obvious.
“Kroger plans to invest $409 million in Houston-area stores from 2014 to 2016, with four grocery stores to open this year, in Baytown, Clute, Cypress and Katy. The company also plans to add six gas stations, expand two existing grocery stores, and remodel 11.”
PLEEEEEAAASE remodel and expand the East End Kroger on Polk@Cullen!!!
commonsense says data is useless. Just use your gut.
East end starting to turn a darker shade of red and expanding. Combine this with the Chron article about the best highschools in town that prep students for college (Eastwood Academy & Yes Prep East End) and it will spell success for the future of East End Investors. Now we just need one of these two story HEBs with the broken elevators.
The income map looks like a Beltway-sized clock showing a time of 7:45. Pretty much the entire area inside the Beltway is very light (lower income) with the exception of the West half of the inner loop, Bellaire (the hour hand) and the Memorial corridor (the minute hand).
Actually, I’ve taken to calling it the “Anglo arrow,” with the arrowhead at Downtown and the shaft out the Memorial corridor. Interesting how EaDo and Riverside Terrace are showing up now, as well as a little square for Lindale Park.
I hope the HEB plans include renovating the one at South Braeswood and Chimney Rock. The grocery stores in the Meyerland-Westbury area are so mediocre.
Seems to me that Houston is almost a dead-on representation of the Latin American city model, and the income map helps support that:
http://wps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/1594/1633178/FG04_18LAmerCity.JPG
That income map shows exactly why we invest JUST on the other (East) side of the 288, inside the loop. It’s such a strange (arbitrary?) deciding line. But apt prices just to the east are 1/4 of that just to the west… While rents don’t reflect the same drop.
“Anglo Arrow.” I like that. And it’s pointing directly at the East End.
Besides Combat Kroger on Polk@Cullen, Fiesta on Wayside@Miraglen, the HEB at Gulfgate and a couple of Sellers Bros. locations, what other full-service grocery stores currently exist in the East End?
Cody,
288 represents a psychological barrier from the nice side and also the border between Yates and Lamar.
@ Thomas (another one): The East End is now very well-served for both full-service grocery stores as well as for smaller but well-stocked neighborhood-oriented c-stores and pharmacies. The issue that people complain about isn’t the number or spacing-out of grocery stores — it’s hardly a food desert — but rather that those stores reflect who shops there and lives nearby. By and large, those people are the working poor and they are ‘ethnic’ and they aren’t high-margin customers. The selection and general aesthetic of a shopping experience reflects that and it makes a certain type of person feel very uncomfortable.
I wouldnt expect the anglo arrow to move very much futher east. People tend to gather around what is successful. Expect the arrow to become thicker and thicker. A good investment spot might be in the corners along the shaft near the arrow head. Thats most likely where people will look to buy rather than risk a venture accross 288 or 59. Ill hold my East End property for a time though. As soon as something happens to that damn KBR lot, prices will jump.
Thanks, Niche. Not being intimately familiar with this area (other than Combat Kroger from my UH days, which may very well get the renovation ILHW desires if the townhomes continue making their way east), I was just curious.
The Anglo Arrow IS moving east, into the East End and EaDo in particular. Census data have shown the Anglo population increasing and the Hispanic population decreasing in these areas, which is notable in Houston given how much the Hispanic population is increasing overall. Furthermore, townhouse plats continue a torrid pace in EaDo and 2nd Ward, and you can bet that many or most of those homes will be occupied by Anglos, and they will generally have higher incomes than the legacy populations of the area.
I totally agree with Niche, the grocery stores serve the longstanding population of the area well. I think earlier posts also forgot to mention the new Walmart, which of course has a grocery store.
The population counts of recent, current, and near-future EaDo development, when combined with the expected residential boost within the CBD, should start to approach levels where a full-service supermarket might get interested in catering to that population (you could further add populations in Midtown and 2nd Ward) – but land costs and physical constraints (lack of the typically large sites they like) will be a challenge. There are some full-block sites in the SE corner of the CBD, however, that have historically been lower priced than the rest of the district. Or if Hearst ever lets go of their property on Dowling…