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A veteran Portland office and multifamily developer is doing something different.

Noel Johnson, a principal at Cairn Pacific, is in the early stages of developing a 14-unit single-family subdivision in Northwest Portland. The homes will be attached, East Coast-style row houses. And they will feature cross-laminated timber in an unusual and potentially influential example of the material’s use in a residential context.

Johnson said he saw an opportunity to fulfill a need for single-family housing for millennial professionals who have outgrown apartments.

鈥淭hey’re all getting older,鈥� Johnson said. 鈥淭hey’re all having families. They want walkable neighborhoods. There’s not much being built for them in Northwest Portland.鈥�

The homes would be built on a vacant lot near Forest Park. The property, slightly more than one block, is roughly bounded by Northwest Wilson and Roosevelt streets and 29th and 30th avenues. The property borders an industrial area to the north and a residential neighborhood to the south and west.

鈥淭here’s a need in the neighborhood,鈥� Johnson said, adding that the homes are intended for people like his sister, who works for Adidas, and his brother-in-law, who works for Nike. 鈥淭hey can’t find anything they want that’s walkable.鈥�

The homes are a small part of a larger mixed-use redevelopment of the area planned by Cairn Pacific, a local developer that has helped transform the Slabtown area of Northwest Portland.

The project will be phased, but at full build-out, the master plan for the approximately 1.5-acre area south of Northwest Nicolai Street includes approximately 300 multifamily units and 20,000 square feet of office and retail space, with a restaurant and shops.

Johnson has enlisted Portland architect Richard Potestio of Potestio Studio to design the row houses. (The pair previously worked together on 120 Clay, the Southeast Portland office development where the online bank Simple is the anchor tenant. Potestio consulted with Ankrom Moisan Architects on 120 Clay’s design). He has not yet selected a builder.

Plans call for the row houses to be either three-bedroom units with about 2,200 square feet or four-bedroom units with about 3,000 square feet 鈥� larger than many Portland row houses. These new ones will likely be built in two blocks, with a passageway separating them.

Johnson and Potestio are considering building ground-floor accessory dwelling units (ADUs) inspired by row houses in Boston, Philadelphia and other cities. In that scenario, an owner could rent out the ground-floor unit to help pay the mortgage.

鈥淚t’s a very logical way to build in affordability and equity in properties,鈥� Potestio said.

Ground-floor ADUs are far more efficient than the typical backyard ADUs built in Portland, Potestio said.

鈥淚t’s a better way to do things,鈥� he said.

Cairn Pacific has applied for a Type III land use review to subdivide the property into 14 lots. Johnson expects the subdivision and permitting process to take as long as his large commercial projects.

Johnson is leaning into the residential market at a time when analysts believe it can support many more homes. In a report released in October, ECONorthwest found Oregon under-produced housing relative to need by about 155,000 units from 2000 to 2015, leading to an affordability crisis and rising homelessness in the state.

In the Portland-metro area, real estate prices have leveled off after a dramatic rise in recent years. The median sale price fell 0.9 percent to $391,400 in November, according to RMLS 鈥� a real estate listing and data service. Inventory grew slightly to 2.8 months.

Johnson said his choice to develop a for-sale residential project does not mean he’s giving up on other development types.

鈥淭hat’s not what’s motivating me,鈥� he said.

New multifamily projects have slowed to a trickle, and developers have blamed Portland’s inclusionary housing program.

鈥淭he apartment market is totally done from inclusionary zoning,鈥� Johnson said. 鈥淭hat’ll be recovering 鈥� I don’t know when.鈥�

Johnson said now, when few other urban single-family projects are being built, is a good time for the row houses to go forward.

鈥淲hen everyone starts to run for the hills is when I sort of wake up,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd when everyone thinks it’s sure money, that’s when I go skiing.鈥�