Bellevue 41st

We're moving to Bellevue! We decided to buy the last lot in YS Development's Bellevue 41st project.

Location

We can give a list of place descriptors, but unlike Seattle or Kirkland where geographic labels mean something to us, we do not really know what these labels entail. The good thing is that even you folks outside of Seattle will have only slightly less understanding of our description than we do.

The site is on Somerset Hill (this one makes sense; it's a geographic feature), near the Factoria Mall (but what is the Factoria area?), but also in the Newport area (the high school and library near-by are named after this), in the south part of Bellevue (the actual city). One thing we know is that people react much more positively when we say "we'll be living on Somerset Hill" than when we say "we'll be living in Factoria."


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Basically, the site is just south of I-90 (major east-west freeway that heads west into Seattle, and east out to the Cascade Mountains and Eastern Washington) and just east of I-405 (major north-south freeway that parallels I-5 on the east side of Lake Washington — this is the main corridor for the Eastside).

This area seems out-of-the-way to someone who lives up in Kirkland.  From there, we rarely have any reason to go south of I-90 unless we're going all the way to the airport, which is another 10 miles beyond Factoria.  Shopping, stores, and most other activities we frequent are either in Seattle or in the Kirkland-Redmond-Bellevue (downtown) area.  We don't go down to Factoria regularly (we've probably been down there less than a half-dozen times). We only pass by it as part of a longer trip south. That makes it seem far away.

But in driving distance, it isn't far.  If traffic on 405 is good, we can make it down there in about 15 minutes; taking the back roads is maybe 20-25 minutes.  Coming from Microsoft, downtown Bellevue, or even downtown Kirkland is less than that. The only awkward part to the location is commuting by bus between there and Kirkland; which is, unfortunately, what Erika does (however, we've already discussed alternative options for her, so we can hopefully find something reasonable).

Project and Site

The project consists of five custom homes; the others are in the range of 2300-2900 sq ft. and $800k-$900k in price.  We're going to be coming in a bit below that at closer to 2000 sq ft. and a bit over $700k (which was the high end of the Taltree project).  The houses are arranged with a short driveway down the middle and two houses on the upslope, three on the downslope.

The houses will probably all be oriented toward the west to take advantage of the views — a few trees close in on the lot, then across Lake Washington to some hills in the south part of Seattle.  The upper floors should be able to see some of the lake, too.  This development won't have the same major community features as Taltree, but there is already discussion of putting in some shared amenities near the end of the driveway.  This development is well along; as of several weeks ago, the first house was fully framed; the second had most of the foundation laid; the third was in design; and the fourth is close to being sold.  I'm guessing we'll start design on a similar schedule with the fourth house.

We are taking the fifth lot, which is closest to the (very quiet residential) road, but is at the western edge of the group (on a western slope, so there will be one house behind/upslope from us, but we shouldn't have anything besides trees blocking our view).  There is a trail that we are hoping the city will develop into real stairs that lead down to the Factoria Mall.  The trail goes right by what will be our backyard, and leaves a nice gap in the trees for the western view. We do have a view of the freeway, and there is some noise; but I found that as soon as you stopped paying attention it disappeared; inside it should be completely quiet.  There should also be enough flat space between the house and tree line to the west for a backyard, which will be below street level.

Design

What does this mean from a design perspective?  We're not as familiar with the lot yet (we'll be meeting with the architect soon for some preliminary layout); but a three-story house has been suggested to take advantage of the slope, with the lower floor being just one room; potentially a media room or guest room.  We're assuming that the entry and garage will be on the east side at the main floor, with the major social areas there; and private living spaces upstairs.

It will probably be mostly west and south oriented; since north is closest to the next house over, and east will be towards the driveway and another house.  West and south are more private, have good light, and have better views.  But we don't yet have a good idea of what the overall shape or layout of the building will be.  The backyard will be at the lowest level, which may be below the main social space, so we may have a larger deck off the main floor (one of the houses currently under construction has this setup).  Overall, though, we want the same functionality and general relationship between areas as we discussed for the Taltree project.  On the upside, now we will have a personal garage right next to our house, instead of a shared one in a different area of the site.

Personal Thoughts

In the end, how do we feel about this?  Well, it is a shame that the Taltree project wasn't coming together in our time frame.  While there is no hard limit in our current location (in fact, we've been quite happy here and could probably stay a lot longer), after more than nine months of waiting, we are very ready to finally have our project underway.  This has the best timeline and least uncertainty of all the options; and also gives us the best value — being part of a project that already has agreements with various manufacturers, we will get those same deals.

We are not familiar with the neighborhood down there, so that is a source of uncertainty.  We did a little bit of exploring, and there are ups and downs.  While it is considered very walkable (an 82/100 on WalkScore), that is pretty much all to the Factoria Mall.  This is not exactly the most pedestrian-friendly areas, but there is a good variety of businesses. Certainly more than Taltree which only had walking access to a (much smaller) strip mall. Being up on the hill is nice. It provides psychological separation from the mall even though it is only a short (though steep) walk away.

Jeff's commute will improve; he may not even need to drive to the near-by park and ride to catch a bus into downtown Seattle. If he ever ends up working on the Eastside, he'll be a short drive away.  Erika is not as happy, since the best bus is a route that takes about 50 minutes from Factoria Boulevard up to Google Kirkland.  On the other hand, she knows there are co-workers who live in that area which might make car-pooling an option; or if she is willing to drive, it will be fairly reasonable, even avoiding the freeway.  Certainly not as good as Taltree would be, though.

While the community will not be as extensive as it probably would be at Taltree, the existing members have formed a good community already, and it sounds like a nice group.  It is difficult to predict what will happen; but even at the other development, nothing is assured.

One disadvantage is that we'll have to change this blog name... (any suggestions?)

Overall, we're happy.  We've both decided it is the best decision; we are happy to be moving forward; and still happy to be working with YS Development.