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Mack Urban development team members spend a lot of time in coffee shops, but not necessarily to drink coffee. They’re conducting research.

“People look for neighborhoods that fit with their personality, and we design buildings to fit with that personality,” said Dayna Dealy, a project manager for the Seattle-based real estate investment and development company. “We’ll sit in coffee shops watching people come in. We’ll sit in the lobbies of other apartments. We’ll see if they have dogs, or friends. What do they like? What do they listen to? We go to the banks and talk to tellers to see what kinds of people have accounts there.”

The idea is to identify tenants’ preferences so that new buildings will appeal to them. As lifestyle-centric city dwellers choose to rent rather than buy a home, developers like Mack Urban are increasingly finding that they must adapt projects to tenants’ needs to remain competitive. To a degree, amenities have become necessities.

Seattle-based Trinsic Residential Group, for instance, is hoping to break ground later this year on a 159-unit multifamily development featuring pea-patch gardens, travel libraries and a rooftop barbecue area. That project is pegged for the former Falcon Auto lot at 419 E. Burnside St.

On Thursday, Mack Urban will present to the Portland Design Commission drawings for a mixed-use development in the South Waterfront District. Construction is scheduled to start in August on a 278-unit complex featuring numerous luxuries. Those include a central courtyard with gardens where tenants can grow their own vegetables, a second-story rooftop deck overlooking the Willamette River, a posh room for watching movies and sports, and areas for airing out camping tents, washing surfboards, waxing skis and tuning bikes.

Dealy said that storage is especially important in Portland. Tenants may be willing to sacrifice unit size for location, but they need lots of room for their gear.

“If I (have a) paddleboard, where would I put it?” she said. “What does it take to make it a place you want to live and not just a stop-off point between living at school and buying a house? It’s really a lifestyle choice.”

Mack Urban isn’t hiding that gear space, but rather giving it a storefront presence so that passersby will see the building’s adventurous tenants.

The building will also have bike and dog washing stations, which have become somewhat ubiquitous in new Portland apartment developments. Sam Rodriguez, managing director of Mill Creek Residential Trust‘s Oregon office, said those amenities are standard in his company’s newer projects, but to date they’ve been utilitarian. He has since realized they could use some items like sofas and TVs.

“We need to jazz them up because people want to spend time there,” he said.

Dogs play such an important role in leasing activity that Mill Creek is even planning to include a dog walk on the rooftop of a 290-unit complex in the Pearl District. Not long ago, Rodriguez would have been reluctant to devote valuable income-producing space to tenants’ four-legged friends. But competition is growing: Industry experts estimate that developers will deliver some 12,000 to 14,000 units this year and next.

Mill Creek is hoping that TV projectors, wet bars, game rooms, a production-scale kitchen, a 14-person whirlpool spa, and a rooftop infinity pool will set its development apart. Rodriguez expects rents to reach approximately $2.45 per square foot.

“All of a sudden these buildings are becoming more like cruise ships than your traditional apartment building,” he said. “People want to have different options within their building, and it also goes part and parcel with the size of the unit. As people go smaller, people want to have more options and more room when they need it – and that’s what those amenities are designed to do.”

Indeed, some of the newer micro units in the city are as small as 350 square feet. Tenants in such spaces will likely look to stretch their legs occasionally. That’s one of the reasons why Mack Urban is investing in its common areas.

The new South Waterfront building’s fitness center will resemble an exclusive athletic club, with comfortable areas for reading. A movie room will include pool tables. A large kitchen will feature space for dinner parties. The mail room will have sofas.

“Instead of just making a mail room, we’re actually making them a place where you want to go and stop and open your mail – I mean elegant,” said Amy Arroyo, amenity and interiors designer for Mack Urban. “We spend a lot of time on the mail area just to make people interact. It’s the one place people will definitely go.”

A centerpiece of Mack Urban’s development will be a second-story deck overlooking the river. It was originally planned for the roof, but designers wanted to give tenants space to watch passersby on the greenway.

All those amenities will be on the same floor, which Arroyo said makes them more accessible to tenants and easier for managers to show. That plays an important role in not only attracting tenants, but retaining them too. In a 250-unit apartment complex, about 10 units switch hands every month, so design can help stem the tide.

“You want people to feel that they are actually comfortable,” she said. “Why would they move? They have everything they need.”