The Bellingham Real Estate Podcast
The Bellingham Real Estate Podcast
EP: 0056 - New Comprehensive Plan. How Bellingham Plans To Add Housing with Nicole Tingvall
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Bellingham is officially planning for a much bigger future, and the numbers are hard to ignore: today’s population of around 100,000 is projected to climb to roughly 135,000 by 2045. So where do all those people live, and what does that mean for homeowners, buyers, and anyone watching Bellingham real estate? We walk through the newly adopted Bellingham Plan (the city’s comprehensive plan) and translate the parts that actually change what can be built, where, and how quickly.
We dig into missing middle housing and infill development, including ADUs and DADUs, and why recent Washington State housing bills are reshaping what a “single-family lot” can support. We also share a real example from the city showing how a larger lot could qualify for multiple infill units, plus why pre-approved ADU floor plans and streamlined permitting could reduce upfront design costs and shorten timelines. If you’ve ever wondered whether adding a rental unit could pencil out, we talk through the practical side, including how some lenders may count a portion of rental income toward loan qualification.
From major growth zones in the north to urban villages like Barkley Village and Cordata, we connect zoning and infrastructure to the amenities people actually care about, like transit access and walkability. We also cover key limits that still apply, including Lake Whatcom watershed protections, climate priorities, tree canopy goals, and landmark tree rules that shape what development looks like on the ground.
Subscribe for more clear, local housing intel, share this with a neighbor who’s curious about ADUs, and leave a review if it helped. What part of Bellingham’s growth plan excites you or worries you most?
Why The Bellingham Plan Matters
SPEAKER_00Hello and welcome to the Bellingham Real Estate Podcast. I'm Paul Balzati. I'm here with Nicole Tingvel.
SPEAKER_01Hi, Paul. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, welcome back. Your second time on the podcast. And today we are talking about the city of Bellingham adopting the Bellingham Plan, which is the comprehensive plan that is now official as of January 2025. That and that is the growth plan that goes through 2045, right?
SPEAKER_01Correct. They want to project out um way in the future. It's a 20-year plan. They do adjust it every 10 years because, of course, you can't foresee a lot of things that have happened every few years. So this was our periodic adjustment.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah. And so this was done through this 9,000 surveys, um, 14 uh open house meetings, a really, really comprehensive uh process. Um and Nicole, the reason I wanted to have you on is Nicole is not only one of our top producing brokers for a long time here, um, but also was the president of the Realtor Association last year, and you are the president-elect of the women's council of Realtors. So, and the Realtor Association has been involved in the process, right?
How Realtors Shape Housing Policy
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. So we have a government affairs committee, and um, they've been active in talking to different city planners, going to different city council meetings, attending these open houses throughout the city um and giving our input and feedback um to what we want to see uh as far as development goes in the city.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And I mean, really, that's that's kind of one of the when people and a lot of people, if you're just if you're not in the real estate industry, they may not understand that the realtor association, yes, it has a code of ethics that we have to abide by. There's there's education involved in the realtor association, but really probably the biggest element of the realtor association is essentially our lobbyist group for our industry, but really for housing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. So advocacy um and not just for the profession, but advocacy for our clients um is very important part of the realtor association.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. And so what are they projecting for um for going from 2025 to 2045 uh for Bellingham?
SPEAKER_01Uh we're going to explode. So we have about uh we're we're right around 100,000 um population right now. Uh they project um about 135,000 people, so you know, 35% growth over the next 20 years. Um, and where are we going to house those people? That's a big concern. Um, so uh the city's looking a lot to the north. Um, there's a lot of uh topog um topographically, there's a lot of um easier access for uh infrastructure for water sewer. Um if we start getting into the south uh part of town and the urban growth areas, we start getting challenges with um the topography and uh mountains and whatnot.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And so, you know, when you have a growth plan, you're gonna have expansion of area, but then you also need more housing within the area. So um explain to everybody what middle housing is, what that's about, and how that's kind of a core piece of this. Sure. Yeah.
35% Growth And Where It Goes
SPEAKER_01So for the new housing, we have to expand out, right? But for um what they call infill housing, missing middle housing, uh, we can look inward. And so um there are some larger lots in town or even lots that are underutilized. And so um developers or even individuals, just homeowners, can choose to put additional dwelling units on their property. So um Washington State recently passed a couple um bills that enable us to allow up to two accessory dwelling units um per lot. Um, and they can be attached or detached, um, or we can have um up to four multifamily houses, um housing units on a lot, or six if two of those are affordable.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's I mean, they in and that's that's a big deal. And that is something that was a that was a state mandate, right? Correct. Um, but the city has adopted it. The city has to implement it, implement it for it actually to take take effect, and the city has, in fact, done that, and not every city has, right? So it's a big deal, it's a really big deal. I want to share um an email that uh another broker in our office got on their own home that they're selling, and this is a home with a larger lot. And as kind of a reference to in the past, you know, in the past four or five years ago, if we emailed the city about something um related to developing our property, um, what's possible, or a listing that we had, you know, oftentimes they would bring up the infill housing toolkit, right? Which was, you know, there was a lot to that. It wasn't like you could just open that up, open up, review the toolkit, and then just it's so obvious what you could do and what you couldn't do. So first off, it was just very convoluted, difficult to figure out what was possible. And oftentimes there was a lot of red tape. It was difficult to figure out.
SPEAKER_01Well, and different rules for different neighborhoods. That was that was tough too, because they would say, okay, you know, in the Roosevelt neighborhood, you can do this, but not in Columbia. And now um they've eliminated that. And so now it'll just be very streamlined, straightforward, residential, low, medium, and high instead of you know, single family pockets, multifamily pockets.
Missing Middle Housing Explained
SPEAKER_00Yes, low, medium, high. That's it. So every area has one of those three zones. So in this um, in this email for his property, which was kind of on the south side of Bellingham, I'm just gonna read off a couple of things that the city said in the email. Um, and this is a 12,000 square foot lot um in the Samish neighborhood, which is area four. So this is just an example. So the city says with the new interim middle housing ordinance, your property is eligible for an additional four info units plus an additional two units if those designated as a four are as are designated as affordable as defined within the ordinance ordinance. This is an addition to the existing residence, which is like a over 2,000 square foot house. Further down in the email, it says this property is eligible for two ADUs, either attached or detached. ADUs are subject to the ADU code, of course. ADUs are limited to 1,000 square feet each and do not trigger street improvement requirements. One ADU can have up to 800 square feet of um ancillary space in addition to the thousand square feet of floor area. If two units are proposed, proposing ADUs would streamline permitting time costs. If developing infill units, these units can be subdivided per the middle housing ordinance as long as the parent property as a whole complies um with the middle house housing ordinance.
SPEAKER_01So that's like That's incredible that the city is actually coming forward and saying what the possibilities are, right? And so before it was like we all had to decipher based on the code what would may or may not be approved. And here they're actually making suggestions on what we can do.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and talk about the streamlining for the two ADUs. You brought that up before we just Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01So they've just started talking about um having some pre-approved um floor plans uh for ADUs, and so that'll help um with the design costs and and upfront um expenses of adding an ADU on your property. And for those who don't know, an ADU stands for accessory dwelling unit. Um and so that is secondary to the primary residents, and um, but you can utilize a lot of the same uh infrastructure, such as the driveway. Um like you read in that email, you don't need to have street improvements in order to build accessory dwelling units.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and you know, when it comes to affordable housing, um this process, it's not like a silver bullet, obviously, to for affordable housing, but you know, there's a property that was they built two eight just on Wilburne Street here, just down the road from our office, where they built um, you know, the two detached units and they where they condominiumized it. Um, and then with that process, they were able to basically they had one house in the property, split it off, did two detached uh homes, and then condominiumized it just in order to basically be able to sell them all separately.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_00And I mean the detached units, what were they like 400,000? Right.
SPEAKER_01So so it's a uh, you know, an alternative to living in a stacked thought condominium or townhouse, and so someone can have their own um little chunk of land, basically.
What New ADU Rules Allow
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so it's like the way I look I'm looking at this, and I'm sure we're it sounds like we're obviously on the same page, it's like this isn't necessarily meaning that it's not driving prices down when this is happening, but if you have a$400,000 budget and you want to live in the city, um having the that option now, it increases your options and it's a brand new detached home. And that wasn't available before this, where you for$400,000 you could buy. And yes, it doesn't have a big yard, doesn't have a ton of parking, you know, it is in this cluster.
SPEAKER_01But not everyone wants to live in a stacked flat condominium. So that does give housing options. And I think um the cool thing about a lot of this infill, these infill projects um is that they do provide opportunities for homeowners to to use the land um that best serves them. And so if you you're no one's forcing you to add extra dwellings on your property. So if you want to have a large lot and no one close by, then keep it that way. If you want to add um an apartment for your mother-in-law, or you want to add something so your um adult children can live on the property until they can afford to get on their own, then this provides those opportunities.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And I want to touch on your personal um investing because we'll talk about urban villages in a minute, but you moved, well, you you own a house in Barkley Village, you could talk about that, but then you moved um into a DADU. So talk about that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Um, so uh my house in Barkley, Barkley Village, it was close to Barkley Village, not quite in the urban village, but it's just up the hill. Um, so I have that as a midterm furnished rental. And then I moved into a townhome in an urban village called the Fountain District that has um an ADU accessory dwelling unit um above the garage. And so I actually chose to live in the detached ADU and rent out um the townhouse.
SPEAKER_00How much is the house? How much square foot is your DADU?
SPEAKER_01Um about 400. About 400.
SPEAKER_00So you're living in tight groups.
SPEAKER_01It is so tidy. Yeah. So I kept the garage for myself and because the, you know, it's sitting on top of the garage. And um, but yeah, it's it's uh it's an adjustment, but it's working for me. And I wanted to be in a walkable area. And um, so that's why I made that choice. And it's just me.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, and so and this is the other way that things can become more affordable, is if you're creative, because when you bought that, you're renting the primary house. Right. So what was your payment like when the house is rented?
A Real Lot With Six Units
SPEAKER_01Uh my payment, my payment was brutal.
SPEAKER_00Oh, that's oh, because you had a big mortgage. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So my mortgage is brutal. Um, but yes, it definitely to rent the bigger unit, the larger unit, it definitely helps to offset. Yeah. Um that, yeah, it's not quite 50-50, but right, right.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. But I mean, you you wouldn't have you wouldn't have pulled it off without wanting to rent it.
SPEAKER_01Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. So it helps to offset that mortgage. And and the cool thing about um our lenders now, they do have um the ability for a conventional loan um to consider 75% of the rental income toward your income to help offset um, you know, the qualification. So um I was able to say, okay, I can rent this for$2,500 a month. Um, so as long as I'm grossing that, then I'm able to qualify for the loan.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because they give you maybe$1,800 credit. Yep. And um, so you're renting the house for$2,500 and yeah, got it. Okay. Plus or minus. Plus or minus, yeah. Give or take. Yeah. And then you can also turn around in that area in Fountain District, you can Airbnb. Right. That one has the ability to short-term rent as well in in urban villages. So that helps a lot. So, and then, you know, let's talk about urban villages. So the where is the growth gonna go? We, you know, we could talk more about the north. You Barkley Village. Um, you know, your house obviously is up the hill, but we're right here, and behind our office is all this acreage, and that's in the um the plan. So it's Barclay Village, Cordotta, where what am I else? Am I missing where we're gonna see more growth, where we're gonna see more houses.
Affordability Through Infill Flexibility
SPEAKER_01Um, I think those are the two major areas for new for new development as opposed to infill development. Um, but yeah, Barclay Village is gonna be huge. It's 2,500 new residences in this area. So that'll a lot of it will be stacked flats over um retail, ground floor retail. Um, but we'll also have some townhouse opportunities and um then some single family residences as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so that's gonna that's gonna make this even it already is an urban village in Barkley Village, but um truly even more so. And then Cordotta, um, what is the latest? Well, there is new construction in Cordada right now, townhomes, single family, and we're just gonna continue to see more. And they and they built that Cordata Park, they've increas they've increased the trail system up there. You know, you have a brewery up there, you have Whole Foods up there, it's kind of becoming its old own thing up there. What else to do?
SPEAKER_01Well, and most of my clients so they'll say, Well, how far from Costco? So Costco is in North Bellingham. So uh, you know, that's driving a lot of of growth up there, right? Uh a lot of people want to be close to amenities. And so we have um, you know, Bellas Fair Mall is starting to kind of pull back on um retail development, but they're starting to get more creative on their uh tenants. And so I've even seen like a maker space there, I've seen a senior center there, I've seen drop-in daycare, coffee shops. Um, so it's not, you know, typical mall, what you'd think of. Yeah. You know, it's just shopping.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So it's kind of there's more amenities in that sense too.
SPEAKER_01And our transit hub is there too. So, you know, that um at Cordada Station, that's where if you were to take a bus to Seattle or Vancouver, um, the Flicks bus would stop at that Cordada Transit St uh Center and then Whatcom Community College is there. So I do see that as being the future um kind of growth area of the city.
Living In A DADU To Invest
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. And if you really care about being close to Costco, I know the ten the new townhomes that are being built right now, you you can walk to Costco.
SPEAKER_01I'm going there after this to show them. Oh, are you? Are you gonna?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I mean, those are nice townhomes. There's a ton of them going in. Yep. Um, literally right behind Costco. Yeah. So um, I mean, overall, um, you know, the where we're going with this is is, you know, it's all positive. It's all positive. It's positive for I think it's positive for the people here. It's positive definitely for our industry and for people who want to move here. And um it's gonna, it's gonna help. It's not gonna, it's gonna not gonna solve all the problems, but it's gonna help. So we talked about north, we talked about Barkley Village, um, watershed. And watershed's completely excluded, right? Correct.
SPEAKER_01So um, you know, we do want to be careful not to present this as every single lot will have this kind of density opportunity because there are some protected areas in Bellingham. Um, and one of them is around the Lake Whatcom watershed um buffer. And so we do draw our our drinking water from Lake Whatcom. Um, of course, it gets uh filtered and purified. Yep. Um, but anything that's kind of around there, they want to really restrict um density. And so those areas do not allow legal um accessory dwelling units and they have maximum um house sizes there. They have um restrictions on when you can disturb the earth. Um, so you can't actually dig up anything or do construction between um October and June every year. Um can't use pesticides, things like that. So um I think that that's one thing you want to make sure if you're looking to relocate here that your agent is aware of those regulations. If you if you do see a large lot and you want and you feel like you can build several houses or ADUs on it, make sure that your um agent knows um the zoning.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and the city has, if you read through the Bellingham plan, the city has a huge section on climate, it has a huge section on parks and trails. And they definitely, and you know, even when you're um when you when you're looking at these lots that are a little larger on how much you can develop them, some of the native trees can be a factor on um on whether you're gonna be able to develop that lot or not. So, you know, depending on where you swing on the politics of all that kind of stuff, it you know, it's definitely undoubtedly Bellingham is definitely sticking to their values as far as um wanting to have the same kind of feel that you know that exists now, which where there's where there's a lot of lot of trees, high canvas area, um, a lot of parks, a lot of trails, and and and continue to kind of have a like a beautiful area to live in and and not it's we're not talking about.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's what draws everyone here. So you know, they don't want to just clear cut and and then um build all these houses. And so, you know, our we're currently about 42% tree coverage, which is very high. Thank you for that. Um their goal is 45%. So they actually uh you know, for every tree you cut down, you gotta plant a few. And then if it's over 36 inch diameter, it's considered a landmark tree. So you do have to have approval to remove that, and it probably has to be dying or or provide, you know, some kind of risk um in order to be removed. Um, but yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So I mean, but it makes it a continue to be a beautiful place to live with with all those natural amenities as well. And then and then of course the the continued uh redevelopment of the waterfront um is exciting too. So it's uh it's all it's all good stuff. Yeah. Is there anything we missed? Anything else you want to add? Hmm. I think we covered it. I think we covered it.
SPEAKER_01Well get our checklist together.
SPEAKER_00Exactly. So if there's uh if you have any more questions, you can reach out to Nicole on the side. And uh thank you for coming on to talk about it, Nicole. And uh thank you for watching or listening, you guys. Cheers. Thanks.