West Loop Cranes Are Adding Apartments, Not Mid-Priced Condos

The lot at the northeast corner of Sangamon and Monroe, across from Mary Bartelme Park, has been several different buildings on paper. In 2021 it was approved as a 19-story condominium tower. In 2024 the developer, Fern Hill, came back with a 33-story rental building. In 2025 the plan became a 27-story tower with a mix of condos and apartments. In September 2026, Urbanize Chicago reported that City Council approved the latest version. It is called Marielle on the Park, and it has 26 stories and 70 condominiums.

According to the same report, Fern Hill has to pre-sell a certain percentage of the condos before work can start.

That presale requirement explains most of what is happening to West Loop housing supply right now. A rental tower can break ground once its financing closes. A condo tower also has to sign up buyers in advance, years before anyone gets a key. With the West Loop's pipeline running that way, nearly all new construction is apartments, and the few new condos are priced well above most buyers. Anyone shopping for a West Loop condo in the middle of the market is shopping almost entirely among existing buildings.

Counting what is actually going up

This is what 2026 alone has brought to the West Loop. The projects below either broke ground, topped out, or won City Council approval this year.

Those six projects add up to more than 2,200 homes, and the longer list is bigger. Cushman & Wakefield's Q2 2026 Chicago multifamily report counted 10,177 proposed apartment units in the West Loop/Fulton Market submarket, more than any other submarket in the region. "Proposed" includes plans that may never get built, so the figure shows developer appetite rather than guaranteed supply. Even so, that appetite points almost entirely toward rentals.

The largest project on the Near West Side won't change that for years. According to Block Club Chicago's report, which the project has republished on its own site, the 1901 Project, led by the Reinsdorf and Wirtz families around the United Center, calls for 9,463 homes over six phases. All six phases are projected to finish by 2040. Work on phase one began in June 2026, and that phase has a 6,000-seat music hall, a 233-room hotel, retail, restaurants, and parking, with completion targeted for spring 2028. It includes no housing.

Where the new condos land on price

The one large condo project actually under construction shows what happens to condo plans that do get built. Sulo Development's site at 1325 W. Fulton won City Council approval in early 2025 for three towers and 240 condominiums. The first tower was to hold two- to four-bedroom homes of roughly 2,400 to 4,500 square feet. The plan called for a sales gallery to pre-sell the first tower before groundbreaking.

In February 2026, Chicago YIMBY reported new renderings showing two towers instead of three, under the name Fulton Bond. One project database now lists about 149 residences, an estimated completion around 2029, and opening prices of roughly $1.55 million, with penthouses above $7.6 million. Those figures are estimates, not developer commitments.

On September 30, 2026, Crain's Chicago Business reported that a penthouse in the building went under contract at an $8.5 million asking price. That sets a new high for the neighborhoods west of the Loop by almost $1 million. The Real Deal noted that the building is still under construction and will not be finished in 2026, so the record sits on a contract and has not closed.

So the condo supply that survives the presale gate starts around $1.5 million and has gotten smaller along the way. A buyer whose budget sits near the neighborhood's median won't find a new building competing for them. They are competing with other buyers for the existing stock.

Why the median fell 21% in the same month as a record

MRED data for the West Loop, covering all property types, shows a median sale price of $425,000 in September 2026, down 21% from $540,000 in September 2025. Read alone, that looks like a falling market.

The other figures from the same month say otherwise. Homes sold for a median of 101% of list price, up from 99% a year earlier. Median days on market were 12, down from 13. Year-to-date sales through September reached 469, up 9% from 430 in 2025. A market where prices are dropping 21% doesn't usually show sellers getting more than asking within two weeks.

The likelier explanation is which homes sold. Only 35 homes closed in September 2026, down from 58 in August. In a sample that small, a few more one-bedroom condos and a few fewer large lofts or townhomes can move the median a long way without any single home losing value. The median list price for those September sales was $399,000, which suggests the month's sales tilted toward smaller units from the start.

Inventory points the same direction. As of October 12, 2026, the West Loop had 120 homes for sale and 67 under contract, with a median list price of $570,000 and about 3.3 months of supply. Asking prices on what's for sale now sit well above the September closing median.

Citywide figures look similar. The Illinois REALTORS August 2026 Chicago report put the city's condo median at $369,950, up 8.2% year over year, on 1,208 closings. Total homes for sale in Chicago fell 23.3% year over year that month. Condo prices across the city are rising while the number of homes on the market shrinks, which fits a market where new condo supply isn't arriving to meet demand.

The building boom lands on condo owners who rent

Buyers looking at a West Loop condo as a rental, or planning to rent it out later, have a different set of numbers to watch. Every tower in the table above is a new, amenity-heavy building that will compete for the same tenants. Julep West Loop's plans include a pool, a half basketball court, a dog run, and a 22,000-square-foot Aldi on the ground floor.

Up to now, rental demand has absorbed that kind of competition. Cushman & Wakefield put downtown Chicago rents at an average of $3,124 per unit, or $3.88 per square foot, in Q2 2026, up 5.3% year over year and well ahead of the rest of the metro. The timing still matters. 1221 W. Washington expects first deliveries in January 2027 and 370 N. Morgan expects first tenants in spring 2027, so hundreds of new West Loop apartments are scheduled to lease up within the next several months. Lease-up periods often bring concessions, and a condo owner renting out a single unit competes with those offers, just without a leasing office.

The same rental wave affects a condo's resale value in two ways. It doesn't add competing condos for sale, which supports the value of existing units. It does add competing rentals, which can squeeze the rent an investor-owner collects for a few years. Both effects come from the same presale requirement.

Frequently asked questions

Are any new mid-priced condos coming to the West Loop? None turned up in current reporting. Marielle on the Park at 23 S. Sangamon was approved for 70 condos in September 2026 and still needs presales before construction starts. Every unit is planned with a private terrace, and the upper floors include half-floor homes, duplexes, and a full-floor penthouse.

How does the presale requirement affect someone buying a new condo? The buyer signs before the building exists, so the purchase depends on the project reaching its presale threshold and then finishing construction. Fulton Bond's approval-era plan targeted delivery in 2028, and a later estimate shows about 2029. Contract terms on deposits and delivery dates vary by project, so review them with your own attorney.

Is the 1901 Project adding homes soon? Not in its first phase. The first phase covers the music hall, hotel, retail, and parking, and the 9,463 planned homes come in later phases projected through 2040.

Pricing a West Loop condo right now means looking past a September median built on 35 sales and comparing the unit with the building's own recent sales and the new rentals going up nearby. Maranda Real Estate Group prepares valuations at the building level for West Loop condo owners and buyers. Request a free home valuation to see where your unit stands against the resale stock and the rental pipeline.

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.