Aqua Blue High Rise Condo Cancelled

2 down... unfortunately many more to go.

Aqua Blue has joined the doomed Krystle Sands project in the "cancelled high rise" club. Citing increased construction costs as the main cancellation reason, the developer of the project, Chicago-based Diversified Real Estate Concepts, decided to scrap plans to build the proposed 46-story Las Vegas high rise condo and are turning their attention to the construction of their other condo hotel project in town named "The Platinum".

The selling point of the Aqua Blue project was its affiliation with basketball great Michael Jordan, who backed the $600 million dollar project with a signature athletic center, a Michael Jordan Steak House and Michael Jordan's "23". Unlike basketball however, even Jordan's star power couldn't lead this project to fruition.

Although Diversified has already completed a variety of projects in Illinois and Wisconsin, they seriously discounted the cost of building in the Las Vegas market. To borrow a popular phrase, "what happens to be built elsewhere, may not happen in Vegas". Despite the high rise being over 50% sold out, there have been cancellation rumors regarding this project for some time now, so this news won't surprise the industry experts in the least.

Similiar to the Krystle Sands fiasco, buyers will have their reservation deposits returned from title, but it won't sit well with them considering all the paper appreciation they've seen and lost in their units.

It goes to show you how careful you must be when selecting a high rise condo hotel as a real estate purchase. The Condo Hotel concept in Las Vegas is a completely new concept and it's wise to due your due diligence before committing to any project.

Low price per square footage ratios are a good sign that developers are discounting how difficult it is to construct high rises. Ground-breaking is always a good sign, which obviously makes unit owners of The Platinum project sleep better at night since that project joins others such as Panorama Towers, SoHo Lofts, Metropolis, Sky Las Vegas, and Turnberry Towers as quality high rise projects in Las Vegas that are currently under construction.