The John S. Park neighborhood in downtown Las Vegas doesn’t see much new development. One Las Vegas builder has plans to buck that trend.
Todd Stratton, owner of Las Vegas-based Kavison Homes, plans to build nine new homes on a 2.5-acre plot of land just west of John S. Park Elementary School near 8th Street and Franklin Avenue.
He said the homes will be sleek and “state-of-the-art” and will feature detached garages and possible separate “mother-in-law” living spaces, but won’t take away from the neighborhood’s artsy charm.
Most of the homes in the neighborhood were built at least 60 years ago. The development is thought to represent the first new homes to go up in the neighborhood, which borders the downtown Arts District and Huntridge Park, in more than 30 years.
The new homes — which will feature between 2,700 and 3,000 square feet of space — will start at $605,000, Stratton said. The development will be known as The Pines.
“One of the people looking to buy is an attorney who wants to have another office above his garage,” Stratton said. “We’ve also talked to artists and people like that. We just recently released this to the public, but we’ve gotten a lot of positive response.”
Initially, Stratton said he wanted to keep the starting prices for the homes under $500,000, but soaring materials costs zapped those plans.
“With the price of lumber, that was going to be impossible,” Stratton said. “Compared to around this time last year, lumber for just one new home is up about $40,000.”
Stratton closed on a deal to buy the land for just under $800,000 in February, according to Clark County records.
Aaron Guidry owns a home just steps from the plot of land where the new homes will be constructed. The home, true to the ambiance of the neighborhood, has a pink exterior with large living area windows that face the empty lot.
Inside, the one-story home is decorated with 1950s-era furniture, including a vintage television and retro kitchen appliances.
It’s quite different than the run-of-the-mill stucco home found in many neighborhoods across the Las Vegas Valley.
Guidry said he was initially a little nervous about the new development, but he thinks it will be better than having a vacant lot, which is often overrun by the homeless.
“I know all my neighbors down here,” he said. "In the suburbs, people kind of run away from you, but that’s not how it is here. We all look out for each other.”
Guidry has seen renderings for the new homes and said he’s mostly happy with how they look, with their angled roofs, plate glass windows and balconies.
“I think the developer did a pretty good job because they’ll have a kind of mid-century modern vibe,” Guidry said. “If you look around this neighborhood, the houses are all pretty unique. My home was built in 1954. Some of the homes here were built in the 1940s, and we take pride in that. We take pride in that uniqueness. We like that they don’t all look the same.”
Stratton hopes to break ground sometime next month. He hopes construction on the initial five homes, which are designed by Ark Studio Architecture, is complete by early 2022.
A Las Vegas Valley resident for most of his life and a 1982 graduate of Chaparral High School, Stratton said he’s had a good time working on the development.
“This is different than most of the projects we’ve done,” Stratton said. “It’s fun and unique. There isn’t any product like this in Las Vegas. I’d love to do something like this in Summerlin if the opportunity arose.”