Invest in Absurd Construction Project, Get Green Card?
February 18th, 2010Via: Seattle Times:
Overseas investors are being pitched a chance to buy into a 45-story condo project in Federal Way, with the added lure of getting a green card for U.S. residency.
A 45-story condo tower — in Federal Way?
That’s the plan longtime Seattle developer Steve Smith and two Korean-American partners unveiled Wednesday.
The Sky Hotel & Residences would be the tallest building between downtown Seattle and downtown Portland, said Patrick Doherty, economic-development director for the low-rise suburb of 87,000 residents.
“It would definitely be the exclamation point on our skyline,” he said.
The $225 million project would be built with money from foreign investors who, under an obscure federal program, can parlay investment in certain neighborhoods into permanent U.S. residency, or “green cards.”
An application by the city and the Sky project’s developer, Twin Development, to include downtown Federal Way in the program was approved by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services last fall.
Without that designation and the inducement of green cards, the proposed condo tower wouldn’t have penciled out, said Smith, Twin’s co-manager.
He said he and his partners, Luke Hwang and Pom Kwak, have been pitching the project to potential investors for some time. “It’s gone very well,” he said, but would not provide details.
Research Credit: JK
