Developers are attracted to East Germantown by low cost, vacant land and greenery
“We have been seeing an uptick in this neighborhood … with mid-rise multifamily fitting into some of these larger lots," the developer said.
A four-story, 35-unit apartment project is slated for 846 E. Woodlawn St., part of a wave of development proposals in East Germantown after decades of divestment.
Although the neighborhood contains many apartment buildings that date to the early to mid-20th century, development collapsed following the 1950s in the era of white flight and neglect of majority Black areas by financial institutions.
As a result, the neighborhood has an abundance of inexpensive, vacant land ripe for development under the right conditions. The Woodlawn Street property last sold in 2024 for $205,000.
“A lot of the new development is starting to push that way the past four or five years up in this area,” said Scott Woodruff, chief operating office with Designblendz, a Philadelphia-based architecture firm that has three projects east of Germantown Avenue.
“We have been seeing an uptick in this neighborhood … with mid-rise multifamily fitting into some of these larger [vacant] lots," Woodruff said.
A smaller version of the 846 E. Woodlawn St. project was put forward in 2021, but the new version includes four affordable units accessible to those making up to 50% of the area median income or almost $48,000 a year for a two-person household.
That will allow the developer, a Far Rockaway, N.Y.-based LLC, to use a zoning bonus that allows a taller and denser building than would otherwise be permitted, as long as it provides affordable units.
It will also have a green roof, which will allow the developer to use another zoning bonus to add more units.
Rent estimates were not available, but even units not designated as affordable are expected to be priced for moderate income renters.
“These aren’t meant to be ultra luxury apartments,” Woodruff said.
The project will not include any studio apartments. Twenty-one units will be one-bedrooms, and the other 14 will be two-bedrooms. The apartments that face the street will have balconies.
Woodruff says Designblendz has been seeing developers propose fewer studio apartments in new buildings, especially in neighborhoods that are farther from Center City like East Germantown.
“It’s harder for young people to buy a starter house, so they are staying in apartments longer,” Woodruff said. “More people have been asking for larger bedrooms.”
There will be 12 bicycle parking spaces in the building, and no car storage provided. A 400-square-foot commercial space will front on the street, as the underlying zoning requires. No relief is needed from the Zoning Board of Adjustment to move forward.
Designblendz also is working on a 34-unit townhouse development to the west of the Woodlawn project, at 610-640 High St., and a midrise, 42-unit project to the east at 1635 Church Lane.
Both are from Frankford-based developer Liberty Bell Management.
All three projects would be built on vacant land. The abundance of buildable lots is one reason for developer interest in the area, but Woodruff says resident demand is there, too.
The abundance of trees and park access are appealing as well, Woodruff said.
“The projects we’ve done [in Germantown], they seem to be leasing in those areas so it must be filling a need for people who need housing up there,” Woodruff said.
