Thriving On the New Gold Coast

Developer teams up with NMC construction students for hands-on learning

By Kierstin Gunsberg | April 27, 2024

From job prospects to housing prices, the last few years have left young adults entering the workforce and housing market with more questions than answers: Is college the right pathway to a sustainable career? Which local industries offer in-demand jobs? And, how much will that job have to pay in order to afford a home?

Those concerns are especially pressing in northern Michigan where real estate prices have steadily increased while wages have stagnated.

One homebuilder, Josh Haselton, has teamed up with leaders at Northwestern Michigan College (NMC) to tackle those questions head-on with a unique partnership that connects NMC’s construction students with hands-on learning opportunities and pairs them with experienced tradespeople on the jobsite. Together, they’re working to beef up northern Michigan’s dwindling housing inventory.

Helping First-Time Homebuyers

“Being a real estate broker, I’ve seen the struggles of our market’s increase,” says Josh Haselton, owner of Northern Den Realty in Traverse City. (He’s also upfront about being one of many benefiting from the ballooned housing prices.)

As a fourth generation northern Michigander whose roots run deep in what he calls the “quintessential Traverse City stuff” like playing high school football and roaming Boardman Lake as a kid, Haselton’s also worried about the future of his hometown because “a lot of first-time home buyers are being priced out of our marketplace,” he says.

While Haselton’s not out to solve the entire housing crisis in one fell swoop, he’s hoping to make a positive impact with a new condominium development, Thrive TC.

Currently under construction off the south end of Garfield Road, the mid-priced, townhouse-style homes are on track to be completed within the year and will create more housing for what Haselton considers Traverse City’s “missing middle.” That is, homes for buyers looking to buy at or below the $300k range.

A quick search of real estate in and near TC at that same price point will bring up scant results, many offering just one bedroom. Those features might tick off the right boxes for certain buyers, but as Haselton has learned both as a realtor and as a father of three, it’s slim, cramped pickings for the average working family. And though his new development is available to anyone in the market for a home, Haselton’s vision in developing Thrive TC has always been “to create a product that someone could have a family in.”

That’s why each of the 26 three-bed, 1.5-bath units comes plumbed and ready to add a fourth bedroom and second full bath in the basement beneath the 1,100 finished square feet upstairs.

The neighborhood will also include quick access to a BATA stop for trips into town, plus family-friendly amenities like a fenced-in dog park, full playground, and pickleball court. There will also be gazebos and grills for taking in the best of summer.

As construction ramps up following a fickle winter, several units are already listed for between $293,500 and $305,900 with Northern Den Realty agent Al Everett.

With nearby comparable homes listed for at least $20,000 more, Haselton’s been able to achieve lower listing prices without shrinking his blueprint by reigning in building costs. For example, each unit follows the same layout, which cuts down on construction time. And with the exception of drywall, all of Thrive TC’s construction, plumbing, electrical, and more is done by Haselton’s own local crew.

Building Futures, Constructing Careers

Thanks to connections made by Everett—who’s been a proponent of the development since its beginning—three of NMC’s construction students recently joined the crew onsite at Thrive TC to put in hours of work in exchange for college credits.

“I’m basically like a little assistant there right now,” says Piper Adams, a first year construction management student at NMC and one of those three interns learning the ropes alongside Haselton’s tradespeople.

For now, she’s relegated to smaller tools, but as she and her classmates explore the nuts and bolts of building, they’ll gradually work their way up to larger responsibilities and projects. “Everything that I’ve learned in class is kind of just getting instilled and developing as I’m out there,” she says.

It’s not only Adams’ first time working in the field but NMC’s first time offering a construction internship to its students. “While we try to deliver a robust education through lectures, labs, and presentations, our students don’t always get as much hands-on training as they would on the job,” says Carolyn Andrews, NMC’s construction technology program coordinator.

The partnership with Thrive TC presented a perfect opportunity to not only introduce construction students to the field, but also to collaborate with community stakeholders on solutions to Traverse City’s housing shortage, a problem that’s not far from the thoughts of college students like Adams.

“Obviously as a young adult I’ve been kind of searching for housing and it almost feels like now you have to have a partner with you or you have to have two to three roommates in order to even slightly afford housing,” she says. “Cost-wise, it’s very difficult right now.”

Realities of the Market

Like Haselton, Adams grew up in Traverse City, and plans to stay here, but what she’s seeing now is far from the Traverse City market—and low interest rates—that folks like Haselton were courting when shopping for a home. Haselton says that a decade ago he purchased his first place, a three-bed, two-bath condo on the west side, for just $72,000.

These days, there’s virtually no finished property for that price anywhere in or near Traverse City. With luxury homes lining the bays and lakes and affluent newcomers snapping up the available real estate, northern Michigan’s beachside towns have quickly become a new gold coast.

And while the latest census data shows that wages in Michigan have risen by 32 percent since 2014, they still haven’t kept up with housing inflation. The development where Haselton bought that first condo recently listed the same units at around 150 percent more than the $72,000 he had originally paid. The condos themselves haven’t changed much, notes Haselton—just the demand.

But, there’s a silver lining for future buyers like Adams and her classmates. As Haselton is quick to point out, if housing demand is increasing, so is the need for well-paid, highly-skilled tradespeople, which the NMC interns are quickly on their way to becoming. Plus, bringing more people into the construction workforce will have a deflating effect on housing prices, since homes can be built faster and in higher quantities.

Haselton hopes to continue adding to that inventory following Thrive TC’s completion, though he doesn’t have a confirmed timeline yet.

In the meantime, Adams says she’s glad to be following a sustainable career path, one she chose because her own dad is a local builder. As she gears up to assist the next phase of Thrive TC, Adams reflects on its mission. “I love what they’re doing. They’re creating communities… and I’m super excited for what’s to come with this project.”