Apartment rentals are hot property in downtown Grand Rapids
One thing that downtown Grand Rapids has going for it: old buildings, many of them empty. Another thing: Demand from people who want to rent an apartment downtown — young people, in particular — has spilled onto waiting lists.
In response, developers are renovating downtown buildings as quickly as City Hall will allow, putting as few as four rental units in some buildings, 30-40 in others and more than 100 in a few.
Developer Sam Cummings, the principal and managing partner of CWD Real Estate Investment, is a believer in rental development in downtown Grand Rapids.
“There is room to run with apartments,” he said. “Rents are doing quite well and occupancy, for all intents, is 100 percent.”