Housing project designed for renters

Housing project designed for renters

By Pamela Klein
NEWS BUSINESS-LABOR REPORTER

Ann Arbor’s normally healthy rental market may be feeling the pinch of a bad state economy, but one local developer has managed to remain strong with a new housing idea.

Dennis Dahlmann, president of Dahlmann Apartments and a developer of rental housing projects around the state, has built a $1.3 million project of single family homes specifically designed for the rental market.

Called Fairwood, the 18-house development is located on Burwood Street on the city’s west side. It is the second such rental housing venture Dahlmann has done in Ann Arbor.

THE THREE- or four-bedroom houses all contain a fireplace, wood deck, carpeting, cathedral ceilings and have the shared use of a pool and tennis court.

Dahlmann, 42, said he decided to build Fairwood “because it wasn’t being done by anyone else and it gave me more options on what to do with the houses.”

Residents in the 18 houses range from families with children to single people, but all wanted the convenience of renting combined with the atmosphere of a single family house, Dahlmann said.

“I was sure there would be a market for these and there was,” he added. “The houses rented almost immediately by word of mouth.”

Dahlmann said the Fairwood development was built while preserving the topography and foliage on the site. The project is integrated with one of his apartment complexes, the 120-unit Westwood Apartments on Liberty Street.

Dahlmann began his career as a builder and developer while a University of Michigan student and today is either whole or principal owner of 1,700 rental units around the state. And, from the initial loan for $2,500 for his first project, Dalhmann’s company’s net worth today exceeds $4 million.

Exterior, interior views are shown for Fairwood, the 18-house development located on Burwood Street
NEWS PHOTO BY CECIL LOCKARD

DAHLMANN