Buying A House: C or D?

this one sold in november for $198k http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1486-Grace-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33502456_zpid/

here are some of the neighboring houses

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1456-Grace-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33502461_zpid/

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1446-Grace-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33502463_zpid/

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1491-Grace-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33502599_zpid/

http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1516-Grace-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33502605_zpid/

lakewood is so fucking cool

one block away, this one sold in november for $250k, it is ridiculous http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1440-Cohassett-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33502488_zpid/

ok i'll stop now

Holy shit, all of those would be at least $500k here, it not significantly more just due to the novelty of that style house which simply does not exist. And I don't even live anywhere interesting.

this house on marlowe ave is still available - http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1485-Marlowe-Ave-Lakewood-OH-44107/33499487_zpid/ - we are thinking about it a lot but not sure if we want to wait for something better. it is a cool house, location is great (apart from being in view of an ER driveway.... the hospital is potentially closing though, otherwise the house is on a very cool street within walking distance to the major commercial/retail area of lakewood), but a few things are making us hesitant:

1) the cooking area in the kitchen blows. the eat-in area is great, eat-in kitchens are also somewhat rare in a lot of these older houses and we are realizing that an eat-in is a necessity for us. but the cooking area is so bad that we'd definitely want to do a remodel. it would have to be a fairly substantial remodel, not just cosmetic shit like getting new cabinets. we'd really need a more workable space in the kitchen. my sister just did a kitchen remodel and it took forever and i don't really want to go through that myself. it could be worth it though, i don't know.
2) it has no bath, and w/ two very little kids we want to have a bath, something we'd have to do immediately
3) front porch is nice, but i have kind of an attachment to those huge front porches that span the width of a house, and those are very common in lakewood. this is not really that big of a deal though since you get that cool first floor sun room and you could also make the second floor front porch more usable by putting in a doorway from the master bedroom (currently it's just a window, what is up w/ inaccessible second floor porches?

i'm wondering if in the long term these are all just very minor things though and it would be silly to pass up a nice house bc of these somewhat easily changeable factors. kitchen is obviously the biggest thing to change, the others are extremely minor

That's a nice house!

You are within walking distance of one the best Indian restaurants in Clevo.

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.4853677,-81.7952118,3a,75y,356.67h,82.08t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sAso8D8m6rXW5sJithc6X6Q!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

cool, i've never been to that one! i grew up going to cafe tandoor in westlake & south euclid

• Didn't even notice there wasn't a tub the first time I looked at it.

• What plans are there for the property if they close the hospital? Would it become a clinic or remain vacant or ...?

I once lived behind a health facility for addiction, and it wasn't always a pretty sight.

But affordable house in nice neighborhood...

hospital is now a family health clinic & ER

http://www.crainscleveland.com/article/20160107/NEWS/160109899/lakewood-hospital-inpatient-services-to-end-in-early-february

I am not enjoying house hunting. I'm trying to remember if I liked it last time and I'm pretty sure I didn't then either.

What a beautiful foursquare, marcos!!! I like the exposed eaves and the very Craftsman touches inside. The current owners have NOT done it justice.

That sun porch on the front may originally have been part of the front porch, and later boxed in? I can't tell, but the symmetrical front would be traditional for a 4sq. The bathroom is an iniquity, slate tile or no slate tile. See what you mean about the kitchen....nice breakfast nook though.

yes you are right about the front porch! there is a very similar house up the road and the porch spans the width of the house

and i agree about the bathroom

My parents 4sq from 1903 had such a small bathroom that it wasn't possible to do much with it. The update from the 1950s used a three-quarters sized tub, which was all that would fit. You can't do a master bath-style renovation in these footprints, so they put in a double-wide shower instead, misjudging what will read "luxury" to buyers. Gross.

Eventually my fam bumped out a whole wall to extend over a 1st floor porch on the back of the house, and added the extra room for a luxury bathroom reno, but it took architects and everything.

Unless you have a bedroom to spare and you can get plumbing to it.

one thing we could do is add a bathroom to part of that third floor attic room, it's huge up there and you would still have a substantial space left

what is the name for this thing and the shape that it has

http://i.imgur.com/kL1Vc6C.jpg

Not sure, but the thought of ever having to get up there and navigate that roofline is giving me the willies.

Maybe it's a bodycatcher.

that is a slightly pagoda-shaped patio cover that's doubling as a second floor balcony.

"pagoda patio cover" is a thing, apparently

"widow's walk?

nah those are on top of houses right

i mean i guess it's a railing for the second floor porch (that has no door to it) but i'm more wondering about that shape that curves out like that, there are a lot of houses in cleveland w/ that especially two-family homes with second story porches

i know you've covered it already but the ppl who built these lovely lakewood homes really hated kitchens huh

haha yea i don't get it

It's kind of a faux mansard roof imo? Which is a standard feature of Italianate houses from around the same era but might be an unusual regional variation if it's used on a lot of foursquares in those parts?

xp their servants did the cooking.

It's also possible that's not the original porch roof, because I would have expected it to have exposed eaves, like those on the 3rd storey.

ppl used to have the smallest kitchens and then a full dining room, wtf people

it's so you can pretend the food magically appears and someone wasn't slaving over a hot stove, I guess

i know you've covered it already but the ppl who built these lovely lakewood homes really hated kitchens huh

Another reason why I'm loving these properties!

It's also possible that's not the original porch roof, because I would have expected it to have exposed eaves, like those on the 3rd storey.

― If authoritarianism is Romania's ironing board, then (in orbit), Tuesday, May 17, 2016 2:40 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yea that's what i'm wondering too

I can see myself hanging out in the sun-room in my robe on Sunday mornings. Another reason to buy this house marcos!

Love sun rooms.

BTW I would also have said mansard about the roof, but it seems very specific to that house form.

Re: small kitchens, I'm pretty sure there are people reading this who have closets larger than my own beloved 1940 house's kitchen. It's about 7x8; I can literally stand in one place and reach everything.

I have a sun room / enclosed front porch thingy and yeah, you can just sit out there and chill. It's especially nice because I have some tall bushes meaning I can see out just fine, but no one can really see in.

xps brownie, yea i keep going back and forth, we saw it in person a month ago but that was really before we were really looking. it's been sitting longer than a lot of other houses too. the rehabbed ones --which to be honest i don't always like, sometimes the updated kitchens look tacky and don't match the period details common in these homes -- sell in a matter of days.

If I were going to buy a house I would want everything redone except the kitchen so I could feel reasonable about doing the kitchen to my spec. Really that's the only reason I'd want to buy a house.

so I can come over on Sundays then? can I call the sun-room the vape room? do you have a hat tree for my fedoras?

j/k

good luck! is Lakewood the only city you're looking?

loooooool

yea lakewood is it, we were strongly considering cleveland heights and shaker heights for a while but most of my family is on the west side

what's up with all that crazy ornate interior decoration though? Is that standard for the neighborhood?

you mean like the wood trim and built-ins?

if so, that stuff is pretty common, though in many homes people have painted over the wood

leaded glass windows are common too, even in shitty remodels most people keep those

yeah, my house has built-in shelves and some nice details
pretty common for the style: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Craftsman

mh you have a craftsman home? sweet

yeah, cleve and shaker hts have some really nice homes for cheap. shaker taxes though are so outrageous though.

cleveland heights has some amazing deals

yeah, it's funny how widespread the style is. some friends in Regina, Saskatchewan posted pictures of their house from the same era and their living room is like mine from a different angle

if you can work around some of the limitations in the floor plans to make things more practical for modern life, you end up with a beautiful house that's built like a tank

this condo is 39K! but the HOA fee is 2k a month :(

it's been my goal to somehow squat in these condos

http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/13805-Shaker-Blvd-Apt-3A_Cleveland_OH_44120_M36250-18982#photo0

holy shit at that fee

yeah, they had to put a new a roof on a historically significant building $$$