The latest conversion of a downtown warehouse into apartments is renting out at a healthy clip, which is nice to hear. At the grand opening, 70 renters had already signed up for apartments in Hubbell Realty’s Riverpoint Lofts, the former Sealy Building just south of the core, with 21 more spaces available. Not bad at all.

And according to a Des Moines Register article about the prospects for a downtown grocery store, we’re on the verge of going from 8,000 downtown residents to 20,000. All we have to do is keep the sidewalks clear so there’s plenty of room for carrying mattresses.

But wait a second: A big building that took a few years to renovate will add maybe 150 people, and we have 12,000 people to go. This suggests that we need to look around and find 80 more empty warehouses to renovate. When spring arrives, and you resume your noontime strolls, keep your eyes peeled.

Fortunately, our newest out-of-town rescue squad, the Foutch brothers of Kansas City, plan to put apartments into the Equitable Building and the Des Moines Building, which will help a lot.

The Fleming Building is turning residential, too, in the local hands of Jake Christensen and Mike Nelson.

And if the rumor about the Register vacating its building at Eighth and Locust turns out to be true, I could see renters enjoying a swimming pool in the below-grade pressroom. A little inky at first, maybe, but that will pass.

Still, old buildings can only take us so far. It’s not easy to make a silk purse out of a dingy building, even though we’ve managed to trick young people into thinking “loft” means “cool” instead of “hard to keep warm.”

I was going to do my part by sending an email to Donald Trump, asking if he would be interested in buying most of downtown Des Moines. If the Foutches can snap up a classic landmark like the Equitable Building for half a million and the Des Moines Building for a trifling $150,000, Trump could put the rest of our empty stock on his Visa card.

But the Trump website makes it clear that email is not read by the great man himself, so I didn’t bother. If you have Trump’s phone number, maybe he’ll listen to you. Remind him that he once sent some cash to the city of Newton just to help out; this would be even more fun.

Then try to get ahold of Warren Buffett. He’s not really a real estate guy, but owning some rental properties over here in Des Moines would give him a nice excuse for day trips from Omaha once in a while. Older gentlemen enjoy that sort of thing.

If there’s no Trump or Buffett in our future, it might take a considerable amount of time to add the equivalent of a U.S. Army division to our downtown population. Especially when you consider that the Army can offer snappy uniforms and extended group outings, while all we have are skywalks.

And, don’t forget, even though no one has mentioned it for almost four minutes, there’s no downtown grocery store.

The equation probably goes something like this: The completed renaissance of downtown equals the number of downtown jobs plus the number of beer kegs, divided by Generation Y’s urge to move out of Mom and Dad’s house.

But first we have to get developers to forget certain other equations, such as: Rehab expenses minus historic tax credits, multiplied by asbestos removal, equals prison time.

Also, we should remind developers that brand-new buildings are a theoretical option. Hubbell’s brownstone block is filling up, for instance, and then there are the collected works of Minneapolis’ George Sherman.

Clearly, the fast lane would be to arrange for Buffett to bump into Trump downtown. They could sort this out in no time.

Maybe you could work out the meeting details. I shouldn’t have to do everything.