Where can Seattle's ultrawealthy store their toys? Condos
In a city infamous for its high housing costs, Seattle's ultrawealthy will soon be able to buy condos for their luxury cars and yachts.
Nearly 9 acres of a former industrial fuel terminal on Salmon Bay waterfront near the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks in Ballard will undergo a transformation into an extravagant car collector garage, superyacht marina and private community called Terminal One Motor + Yacht Club.
Realogics Sotheby's International Realty is leading the marketing and sales of the 100 commercial condominiums. The garage spaces will range in size from approximately 850 to 1,250 square feet and have nearly 20-foot ceilings.
The condos will start at around $600,000 and exceed $1 million, said Dean Jones, owner of Realogics Sotheby's International Realty, while the slips, or parking spots for yachts, could go for up to several million dollars.
The project's announcement comes just weeks after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's megayacht drew attention for rolling into Seattle after layoffs of 1,400 King County Meta workers. The megayacht's arrival jump-started a conversation about how tech-centered Seattle attracts displays of wealth that can be in stark contrast to the city's affordability problems.
The commercial condos and yacht slips can cost as much as a house in Seattle, which many cannot afford. But for wealthy car collectors and yachties who see their rides as part of their assets, the money is worth it.
"These folks have spent, in some cases, millions of dollars and decades curating their collection. Why wouldn't the envelope that protects and showcases that collection be as equally important as the collection itself?" Jones said.
Plus, the Terminal One Motor + Yacht Club will be much more than storage, he said. Owning a spot at the club means access to a community of elite car and yacht lovers, private events and security for their valuables.
Construction on the commercial condo units could start as early as the end of this summer, he said. The units will come as blank slates ready for customization. Collectors can purchase multiple garages and combine them into one, Jones said.
Jones said he imagines many of the commercial condos will include car lifts, wine cellars or pool tables - and that collectors will try to one-up each other with customizations.
Although there are many individual garages and marina slips for luxury transportation around the Seattle area, the Terminal One Motor + Yacht Club will be its first organized community of individually owned garages.
The Seattle-based interior design firm Olson Kundig, which is designing the common areas and conceptual collector garage interiors, can advise on personalization projects, according to a news release.
People (well, actually, cars) could move into the condos as soon as summer 2027, according to the developer, Cantera Group. However, the deep-water super yacht marina with moorage for sale will come later, possibly in late 2028.
Although the residential condo market in Seattle is struggling to find buyers, Jones is hopeful that the luxury car and yacht condo market is not.
Many have already expressed interest in purchasing a space, he said. Realogics Sotheby's International Realty plans on holding an event in Kirkland on Sunday where collectors can preview the project and reserve ownership.
The event comes the same weekend as the 2026 Formula One Louis Vuitton Grand Prix de Monaco. Jones said car collectors are calling his company from Monaco asking to set up a remote facility to review and secure their bid.
Cantera scooped up the four property parcels along the industrial waterfront area of Salmon Bay in 2020 for $5.6 million, around $14 million under its assessed value at the time.
The property between 2727-2808 West Commodore Way was formerly the Time Oil Bulk Terminal, which stored large quantities of fuel during and after World War II to support war efforts. While shuttered in 2001, the site's former operations had released petroleum hydrocarbons, chlorinated solvents, wood preservatives and metals into soil and groundwater.
Cantera partnered with the Washington State Department of Ecology to clean up the site in 2018, according to the news release. The remediation work was completed in 2021.
"We believe Terminal One Motor + Yacht Club answers a growing demand for a facility that will forever celebrate both land and water motor works while paying homage to its industrious past," Doug Ciserella, Principal of Cantera Group, said in the release.
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This story was originally published June 6, 2026 at 6:42 AM.