Are You Looking For A Complete Fixer On Beautiful Fullerton Parkway? 518 W. Fullerton Pkwy in Lincoln Park
This vintage 3-flat at 518 W. Fullerton Parkway in Lincoln Park became available a few weeks ago.
It is for sale by owner.
Built in 1885, it has been in the same family for decades.
It is an all brick building on an extra long 25×175 lot.
It has a 2-car garage.
The property has many vintage features including the original hardwood floors with inlaid and the original tiling around the fireplaces.
There is also an original built-in hutch in one of the dining rooms.
This hasn’t been the only fixer property available on Fullerton Parkway recently.
636 W. Fullerton Parkway, which was a 3-story frame house built in the 1880s with a 3-car garage, recently sold after about 2 months on the market.
You can see the exterior picture and listing for that property here.
It was listed at $999,000 and sold on December 12 for $1.035 million but it was also on a slightly wider lot measuring 30×175.
This 3-flat is also listed at $999,000.
Will it sell for a similar price as the 636 W. Fullerton Parkway property?
Listed For Sale By Owner. See the property website and pictures here.
518 W. Fullerton Parkway: 10 bedrooms, 4 baths, 2 car garage
- Sold sometime before 1985
- Currently listed for sale by owner for $999,000
- Sold “as-is”
- Taxes are $4826 (senior freeze)
- Full basement (7 foot ceilings)
It would cost at least a million and probably more to get this place in shape. I wonder what the land alone is worth? Good location, but I’ve never been a fan of being right on Fullerton. There’s usually a traffic jam on this stretch.
“It would cost at least a million and probably more to get this place in shape”
it probably would Mr. Robin Leach, but for the rest of the yocals (that dont need a gold and marble foyer) and vintage lovers there looks to be a lot that can be saved like the floors look super fab and just need a refinish.
now the question is do you want to be an a slow moving traffic congested street, even though is one the most beautiful slow moving traffic congested streets in chicago?
now given a few homes that were finished on this stretch have sold from 2mil to 4mil even if you put a 1mil into this your still ahead.
That current real estate tax amount is a travesty. Prime Lincoln Park location, masonry 3-flat, oversized lot, and tax bill is less than many 1-bedrm condominiums in area, and oh, current owner wants a cool $1 mil for property. Our crooked assessor should look at owner asking prices when he’s re-assessing individual parcels listed for sale..
636 was better, both because it already looks like a nice SFH and because it’s situated next to other SFH’s/RH’s (whereas 518 is right next to a less than charming apartment building).
Worst thing about this exact location is the hideous apartment building next door.
Wouldn’t hesitate to live on Fullerton.
“[tax rant]”
Um, it’s noted that it’s subject to the senior freeze. The 2011 assessed value was 123,739, implying a market value 25% *higher* than their asking price.
Not that that is a defense of our assessor, in any way.
Looks to be in really good shape… cant imagine much needing full replacement other than the kitchen, bathrooms and possibly windows depending on how old they are. Refinish the floors, clean up the vintage pieces, repaint, refinish the radiators, new kitchens, new bathrooms, blow in new insulation, check integrity of rear porches, check brickwork if it needs tuckpointing, check roof, check mechanicals.
Even if you need to tuckpoint it, re-roof it and replace the boiler I cant imagine it taking anywhere near $1mm to get this place in great working order. Maybe if you went top notch with the kitchen/baths, space pack, reformatted the floor plans and the electrical is a 80 year old rats nest, then yeah, its going to end up in seven figures.
What do 3 bed apartments go for in this area?
I wonder if you could just rent to DePaul kids until it was so dilapidated it qualified for FEMA aid…
Nice bones and seems like a decent deal – but that tacky miniature golf green carpet/turf on the back porch needs to be burned, why on earth do people put that on outside porches and decks? ick.
This seems like it would be a good investment property if kept as apartments.
Robin Leach? More like rob and leach cuz this owner is trying to rob whoever is buying the place while leaching off society by exploiting tax loopholes. All because of Obama!
If I only I could afford it! I hope someone buys this and restores it-preserving all of the wonderful details!
OK – I obviously don’t have vast knowledge of rehab costs, as everyone can now see. So $1 mln was too high. I didn’t mean it needed to be Robin Leach-esque.
An FSBO seller who doesn’t appear to be insane.
I hope whoever buys this keeps it as a 3 flat. Assuming no structural issues, you could make this into nice rentals for $150k easily. And that’s assuming you’re replacing all windows, new plumbing and electric, rebuilding parapet walls and chimney, fixing roof and installing IKEA kitchens. Lead abatement, done properly, could drive that up, I suppose. Not sure what rents are around here, so I don’t know if it would be worth it.
“nice rentals for $150k easily. And that’s assuming you’re replacing all windows, new plumbing and electric, rebuilding parapet walls and chimney, fixing roof and installing IKEA kitchens.”
Who is your contractor? Especially your plumber and sparky.
Planning to keep the hot water heat, right? sticking with heat included, and not splitting into three systems? Assumption (despite listing saying *all* except roof and parapet 100 years old) that the boiler and main supply lines were both redone in the last 50 years, right?
Since that plan is non-o/o, all permitted and inspected work, right?
And, won’t the new, code-compliant, back porch set up cost $20k+ all by itself?
Yeah, I was about to say the porch would be an added issue. All those college grads jumping up and down on it at their parties and whatnot. My bad.
I think plumbing and electric could be done for $30-40k for the entire building. Permits, inspection, whatever, I’m not talking about some fancy new design. I’m sure there’s one wet wall in this place. If the radiators need extensive work, junk them and install gfa. Fail to see what’s complicated about this — if you’re retaining as a rental 3-flat. And, as it happens, I would almost expect that somebody buying it at this price for this purpose is o-o.
Actually, I think Miu-Miu should buy this with her $300k pot of cash. She could put 20pc down and get a HELOC and use balance of cash to pay for reno work.
Agree with Anon re what 150k will get you. Mind you, I love vintage but this needs TLC and the $150k estimate is not even vaguely in the ballpark for permitted and inspected work with stuff that didn’t fall off the back of a truck. Plus I imagine it needs vintage building appropriate masonry work (ie repointing –not tuckpointing–with the correct grade mortar). Lovely vintage, though, just waiting for new life.
“I think plumbing and electric could be done for $30-40k for the entire building. Permits, inspection, whatever, I’m not talking about some fancy new design.”
Again, I ask for the names and numbers of your licensed plumber and electrician who would re-plumb and re-wire this place for under $20k per job. I’m *completely* serious.
$450 K rehab and 9 months to complete it and we are moving in.
Anon, I humbly retract my estimate.
Since I’m here to learn, what would you guess is the cost differential of doing the plumbing and electrical work with permits vs. not? Assume each option is done with the same licensed/insured tradesmen; also assume that the work you’ve asked them to do is exactly the same.
Nonchatterer, it is way out of my budget range.
“Since I’m here to learn, what would you guess is the cost differential of doing the plumbing and electrical work with permits vs. not? Assume each option is done with the same licensed/insured tradesmen; also assume that the work you’ve asked them to do is exactly the same.”
Oh, I dont think the permitting would add a ton to the costs, when you’re already using the licensed guys–maybe 20%. The big savings is in having guys who arent “plumbers” doing your plumbing, and the same guys playing sparky (not that they arent doing a good enough job at both), which is harder to pull off, fully permitted. And it really depends how complete the job is–but I think that merely replacing existing electric wouldnt meet current code requirements, and that the bare minimum plumbing job might also be short–assuming they are accurate in saying its all original.
And, yes, I do think that the proverbial pickup truck contractor could bring this up to three nice looking, but still “rental grade” units for about 150k + the porch, but that’s someone who would make his profit off owning the building–he’d charge you or me a lot more to do the same work. At ‘retail’ I’d think a good budgeting starting point is $50 psf, plus finish materials (cabinets, tile, fixtures, doors), plus porch, plus boiler/hvac, plus windows, plus any flood control, plus any bizarre elec/plumbing issues, for non-fancy rehab. Really seems more like $250k minimum (assuming minimal sweat equity–whatever you can/will DIY drops that number) to me, and that’s not ‘restoring’ the wordwork.
I’m not sure that I follow the “keep this as rentals” approach. How much could you really get in rent for these units? $5000? Also you can have the senior freeze for rentals? Or is it owner-occupied in part?
i love that third floor kitchen set up, wash the clothes and then dry them in the oven
Houses like this one were built as a 3 flat, as apposed to an original single family that was later converted into apartments – two different animals. Buying this with the intention of converting it into a single family would be a huge and expensive task: no open staircase that reaches all floors (need a new staircase), total reworking/rerouting of the plumbing (if it’s any good to begin with), modifying all the rooms (do you really want a dining room hutch on the 2nd floor?), once you modify the rooms the inlay in the wood floors becomes out of place (replace the floors), what was once the kitchen on the 3rd floor is now a bedroom (need to add a closet and bath, but that throws off the balance of the original layout), not to mention basic structural updates and unforeseen issues which *will* happen, on and on… and on. You’d basically have to gut the place, save what details are worth saving and reinstall them where you can. Cost: easily $750K+ for a very basic renovation (no designer kitchen cabinets in that price), as who buys a $1MM shell with taxes that would jump to $20K+ and wants an Ikea kitchen?
The best bet would be renovating the units to mediocre standards and selling them as condos. I predict some pick-up contractor will do just that, as that tends to be the case with most original 3 flats in the neighborhood.