All Forum Posts by: Annie G.

Sorry if my post was redundant to what you know, Kim. I must have been typing it up when you posted.

I haven't dealt with this personally, but in talking to Economic Development folks, my understanding is that the City of Tacoma does have some hurdles if you change the permitted use of a building. Say you wanted to change the lot from residential to commercial restaurant space, the city requires external improvements, such as making the corner cross walks ADA accessible and reprogramming the traffic lights to be pedestrian friendly. This can add significant costs and just needs to be on your radar when running numbers. Depending on the size and scope of the project, the City of Tacoma might be willing to partner- Seven Seas is a great example. Because they revamped two city blocks, they received a grant to help fund the cross walk construction.

Third to what Andrew and Ryan mentioned about meeting with economic development. They are very receptive. Here's a link to the Economic Development Services page with all of their contact info. It doesn't hurt to just shoot them an e-mail with questions.

@Tom Majewski Thank you for the thoughtful response and the follow up e-mail. It's good to hear that things have stabilized, because I really am happy with the quality of the cabinets! Cheers to you, and I look forward to another Cliq partnership in the future.

@Nghi Le L&D came in about 10% cheaper for the same layout, but the quality of the Cliq cabinets is far superior to the ones that L&D had in their Tacoma showroom. Tight dovetail joints and soft- close hinges. 

@Tom Majewski one piece of feedback for Cliq: improve post order communication and customer service. Send an e-mail along with the shipping notice informing customers if an order is not complete. That small and simple piece of information would have saved so much headache and time for both myself and your customer service department. During the process, even an occasional e-mail from customer service with "we're working on it" would be appreciated.

Here's an update on the Cliq cabinets now that we've finished the kitchen remodel and they've been in use for a few months.

Overall, we are happy with the quality of the cabinets. But, the process of getting them was a major hassle that set our timeline back 4 weeks.

Pros: High quality at a low price. The design process was easy and their designers are great and willing to go through several design drafts (I worked with Bill Hoeppner). They e-mail you a cabinet call out that you can take to local shops to compare prices. Cabinets come fully assembled, making install easy. Two pieces were warped, a door and a piece of crown, but those were quickly replaced after filing a claim online.

Cons: Their post order customer service is terrible. Initial delivery was missing 3 cabinets. I thought it was a delivery error, but when I called Cliq, they told me they had intentionally shipped an incomplete order, and that the 3 missing cabinets were "somewhere in production." Customer service folks are not physically at the assembly factory, so they said there was no way to check where the missing cabinets were in production. Factory folks do not man the phones to answer any questions. Thus, I was never able to get a delivery date estimate- would it be 1 week or 1 month? No follow up communication. I had to call every few days to get an update, which was that they didn't know how long it would be. This kept our project in limbo and delayed for 4 weeks. 

Timeline: 

Design process- if you know what you want, designer can get it done in 1-3 days

Order to initial delivery (Washington State)- 4 weeks

Missing cabinet claim to delivery of all cabinets- 4 weeks

 Total time from order to complete delivery- 8 weeks

Where in Tacoma is your house located? What are the specs (Bed/Baths, and square footage)? I would not trust "Zestimates" or Redfin Estimates, but in certain areas of Tacoma (i.e. North End), homes are selling at 2006/2007 prices.

The areas are very different in look and feel. 

University Place is a growing white collar neighborhood with a desirable school district. There has been quite a bit of development and the area has a wide variety of amenities, including a Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, Harbor Greens, etc. 

The Swan Creek area (East Side) is a blue collar neighborhood with high crime rates and low ranked school systems. I often mountain bike at Swan Creek and have seen several car windows smashed in around the park. It is a food dessert, albeit for the East Side Farmers Market, which has the backing of the City of Tacoma. East Side EnAct has helped put up tons of new town homes in the past few years.

A basic google search for neighbor data & statistics will give you an over view of differences- i.e. median income and crime rates.

Brandon Hall posted a blog post about the tax implications of an AirBnB that would be worth your time to check out. https://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2015/07/05/tax-impact-airbnb-short-term-rentalsinvestors/ He also did an episode about it on his podcast, The Real Estate CPA, with the same information, if audio works better for you.

@Andrew Harris  Depends where in North Tacoma. In Proctor? Yes. I paid $1,500/mo from 2013-2015 for a 4bed/2bath house in Proctor and felt like I was getting a stellar deal, and would have paid $1690 to stay (had I not bought my own home). You can always do what the others have suggested- put up an add on Craigslist and see what kind of responses you get.