Robert Darrow, @properties

Archive for the ‘Wellington Park’ Category

1739 W. Wellington

New Listing in Wellington Park is open this Sunday from 1:00 to 3:00. 1739 W. Wellington is a true three bed plus den/4th bed – rarely on the market in Wellington Park. This home features 2,815 square feet on four floors of living, and a two car garage plus two car driveway.

List Price: $650,000

Open Sunday from 1:00 to 3:00

Check out the full listing at www.townhomeshop.com including a Video Tour.

2669 N. Greenview, unit A

Beautiful end-unit at Tamerlane. New custom chef’s kitchen with high end appliances, over-sized island & built-in desk. First floor family room opens to yard with new fence. Large living room with wood burning fireplace, high ceilings, over-sized bay windows, combined with dining room. Three bedrooms all on the same level upstairs. Master suite has a large walk-in-closet and marble bath with steam shower.

List Price: $660,000

Open Sunday from 11:00 to 1:00

Check out the full listing at www.townhomeshop.com including a Video Tour.

New Listing in Wellington Park is open this Sunday from 1:00 to 3:00.  1739 W. Wellington is a true three bed plus den/4th bed – rarely on the market in Wellington Park.  This home features 2,815 square feet on four floors of living, and a two car garage plus two car driveway.

1739 W. Wellington

List Price: $650,000

Open Sunday from 1:00 to 3:00

Check out the full listing at www.townhomeshop.com including a Video Tour.

New Listing in Wellington Park is open this Sunday from 1:00 to 3:00.  1739 W. Wellington is a true three bed plus den/4th bed – rarely on the market in Wellington Park.  This home features 2,815 square feet on four floors of living, and a two car garage plus two car driveway.

1739 W. Wellington

List Price: $650,000

Open Sunday from 1:00 to 3:00

I just signed the paperwork to list a Wellington Park Townhome this evening.  But the owner won’t be finished painting until after the weekend.

I can sneak a few lucky buyers in beforehand.

The peak price for this floor plan was $660,000.  My motivated seller has listed this home for a quick sale at $583,500. 

The location of this home is on Hermitage Street.  It’s one of the 2,561 square foot homes with three bedrooms, and 3.5 baths.

Here’s a photo of the row:

And a floor plan for the unit.  Note – there is a half bath added to the kitchen just adjacent to the stairs.

Call or write if you would like to gain access to this desirable listing before it hits the general market!

I have been working with a delightful couple looking for a new home in the Lakeview neighborhood.  We met each other over a year ago while hosting open houses in my listings at Wellington Park.  These folks returned time and again – viewing most of the units that came available during the past year.

As they are getting closer and closer to making a decision, one wish kept coming up:  a desire for more storage space.  Townhomes in Chicago tend to have wall closets rather than walk-ins, limited space for extra stuff in the garage, and very few spare closets for linens and random extra storage.  In Wellington Park, a lot of residents keep their second car outside as we have large driveways.  And then use the extra room inside the 2 car garage to store more stuff.

So my customers wondered if it was possible to locate something with more storage, and their minds wandered to properties that offer basements.  What immediately springs to mind are single family homes.

And we also realized that “Duplex” floor plans also offered some additional room space and/or storage.

Here’s where you have to think carefully about trade off’s in Chicago.  In and around West Lakeview, single family homes can be clustered into three types:

1.  Old homes that a family has remained in for a very long time.  These homes usually date to the 1930′s.  The floor plans are functionally obsolete as they only have one bathroom, very limited closets, and frequently no air conditioning.  Often times they have not been updated, so the decor and fits/finishes are 1970′s or older.

The homes of that era also feature shallow basements (not a lot of head room) and less than 1,800 square feet above ground.  Typically, each floor was 800 square feet.  And often, the second floor is smaller as the roof line cuts into the second floor space.

These are mostly tear-down’s.

As the price of these homes is primarily for land value, the prices escalated to a high of $550,000 in 2007.  They have since settled back to $450,000 with the real estate downturn, but townhomes in the neighborhood are mirroring these movements.

2.  Old homes like those above, but were renovated in the 1980′s or 1990′s.  It made financial sense in the 1980′s and 1990′s to buy these old homes and modernize them.  The land was worth less than $100,000 back then, and the house barely added another $25,000 to the cost.  You could renovate for $25,000 to $50,000 and get a nice house for well under $300,000 throughout those decades. 

These homes often have added a second bathroom (perhaps even a third in the basement.)  Most of the time, though, you still don’t get a master bath suite.  Though these homes technically are “modern” with central heat and air, kitchens with full appliances, and the additional baths, the decorating is often “dated.”  Think “Miami Vice” for the color palate and you won’t be too far off. 

The square footage is slightly improved because during the renovation, it was typical for a homeowner to “dormer” the second floor to add headroom to the smaller bedroom and the bathroom.

But these homes still are short on square footage compared to the modern townhomes that have sprung up in the same neighborhood.  A Wellington Park townhome features 2,000 square feet of living space (not counting the garage) and some models are significantly larger.

Prices for homes like this tend to fall mostly in the range $750,000 to $850,000 depending on whether the house is on a very desirable street or a less desirable (perhaps busy) road, and the quality and style of the renovation.

3.  Mansions. 

The modernization of the old small homes slowed or stopped during the 1990′s until now because land values crept up making it less desirable to buy one of these and fix it up instead of traveling to a neighborhood farther afield and getting a house with a more modern floor plan and more space for less money.

During the early 2000′s, the West Lakeview neighborhood exploded in popularity when an entire industrial corridor was removed and relocated.  The new land accommodated some sharp new developments; each a little more expensive than the last.  The newest included some single family homes sprinkled throughout.  Prices for the houses drifted up over $800,000, then over $900,000 and finally over $1-million. 

The “modest” mansions feature 4,000 square feet of living space, modern floor plans, and every comfort imaginable.  The “luxury” and “ultra” mansions feature even more space, and the very best materials money can buy.  Electronics packages, heated garages, green design features are all common as you approach the $2-million mark.

4.  Duplex floor plans.  Developers in recent years have expanded upon the traditional three-flat floor plan with a modern twist.  Newer three-flat style condominiums usually feature a first floor unit that duplexes down into the lower level affording an additional bedroom, an additional bath and often a family room.  Upstairs, the second and third floor units are two or three bedrooms.  Some of the top floor units are duplex-up style, but just as many are not.

These duplex floor plans usually offer more square footage than a townhome in a similar price range as the space for the home does not count the space occupied by parking.  Parking is behind the building – in a garage or outdoor spot. 

But because of the standard size of a Chicago lot – 25 feet wide – these condo’s typically offer only one parking space per condo.

Since the last chapter of this story has not been written yet, I am curious to see how it all turns out.  But to run through the circular conundrum again, I wonder which of these seemingly exclusive paradoxes will win out:

1.  The client likes townhouses.  But thought it might be nice to have some extra storage. Therefore…

2.  We explored houses.  They have extra storage in the basement.  But the floor plans are dysfunctional and the decorating is from another era.   Therefore…

3.  We explored duplex floor plans.  The offer an extra family room, modern floor plans, and some additional storage in a downstairs/basement.  But the thing that attracted us to townhomes in the first place is missing.  Namely – the two car garage.  Therefore…

Back to number one!

Stay tuned – I’ll keep you up to date!

Zillow – the home valuation website – emails me regularly to tell me about the values of homes I “claimed” either as a listing agent, or as the owner.  Month after month, I receive cheery emails about how my home has lost some more value.

Check it out!

This month, the system has decided that my house has rebounded a bit.

This is a bit weird, too, since one of my neighbors’ sales just closed.  And the sale price wasn’t pretty.

I think if you read the fine print on the Zillow website, however, they only use properties that are currently for sale in their calculations.

** Correction – Drew from Zillow writes in comments below:

we calculate zestimates on 65 million homes across the country and definitely don’t only use properties currently for sale in those calculations.

I have to thank one of my neighbors for listing for $899,999 – I think.

On Thursday evening, the Chicago Park district held the third meeting to solicit input from area residents regarding the development of Chi Che Wang Park – located just north of Diversey at Wolfram and Hermitage.

The Park District’s final plans were revealed, and a final round of input on a few details was taken from the crowd of residents.

The meeting was the most well-attended of all meetings.  Many thanks to Diversey resident Adam Cole for getting the word out to nearly 200 area residents.  There were approximately 50 people in attendance last evening.

The layout of the park was pretty well set after the last meeting.  At this meeting, representatives from the Park District sought input on a few final issues:

• Where residents would like to have a couple extra gate entrances into the park?
• Children’s play area as originally designed?  Or larger?
• What kinds of play equipment and its color scheme?
• Would residents like to keep the park restricted – prohibiting dogs altogether? 

Above:  the children’s play area as originally designed.  Below:  the children’s play area expanded.  In the version below, the children’s play area is expanded by 25%, but only reduces the amount of open space in the entire park by 2%.

(For comparison, the play area in the small park is larger than the play area in the Hartland Park play area located in Hartland Park across Diversey behind the Regal Lofts.)

In the version below, the open space on the left side of the park is reduced by ten feet in width.  But still at 50′ wide rather than 60′ fee wide, residents felt this was plenty.

Overwhelmingly, residents voted for the expanded children play area.

A vote was taken on the color scheme for play equipment.  Residents overwhelmingly favored a natural colored theme rather than a brightly colored theme.

There will be an activity set as pictured below, a swing set as shown below, and three sculptural pieces in the play area.  The activity set shown below is also an example of the natural color scheme selected buy the residents.

A couple questions answered by the Park District:

There cannot be a water feature in the park.  The infrastructure and the feature would add $350,000 to the cost of the park.  There is no money for a water feature in the $500,000 budget for the construction phase.

Two lights will be installed along the walkway from Diversey along the Metra tracks.  No other lighting will be installed in the park.

The Park District officials took a vote of attendees to ask the opinion of everyone whether they would like to keep the restriction against dogs being allowed in the park.  The room overwhelmingly voted to keep dogs prohibited from entering the park.

On a personal note:

I know of at least eight households that I am friends with that have dogs and have expressed that they have feelings ranging from disappointment to outrage that dogs are prohibited from the park, currently, and now will be prohibited after the renovation is complete.

• To my neighbor who will complain non-stop for a full 30 minutes at a crack when I see you on the sidewalk, but have never come to a single community meeting in the entire time we have been neighbors,
• To my neighbor who came home just in time for the meeting and we spoke in the driveway, but you went upstairs to watch TV instead,
• To my neighbor who would rather hang out in a bar instead of showing up and raising your hand in the air – without a glass in it for a change,
• To my neighbor who spends more time composing long diatribe emails to me after every meeting that you miss than you would have spent at the meeting itself,
• To my neighbor who has no kids but has a dog, yet never enough time to come to a meeting even though there were dozens of residents who have families at the meeting,

Thanks for all your help.  You all got just what you deserved.

Residents of Wellington Park Townhomes were saddened by the sudden death of three trees in the 1700 block of West Wellington.  The City of Chicago came by today to remove the dead trees.

The combination of perfect weather and the landscaping in perfect condition inspired your guide to photograph the property.  We have photographs of nearly every townhome in Wellington Park showing the community at its best.  If you have need for photos of your home during the gloomy winter months, you need look no further than your trusty guides and we’ll hook you right up.