Will a Renovated Kitchen Sell This Vintage Beauty? 2127 N. Sheffield in Lincoln Park
We chattered about this 3-bedroom vintage unit at 2127 N. Sheffield in Lincoln Park over a year ago- in March 2008.
At that time, it was being marketed more as an investment-type unit for DePaul students due to the three bedrooms.
See our prior chatter and pictures here.
It is now back on the market and the kitchen has been totally renovated.
BEFORE:
AFTER:
Will a new chic kitchen with stainless steel appliances sell this unit?
It has central air, parking, and a dining room (the fireplace is only decorative.)
Amber Wilson at Baird and Warner now has the listing. See all of the pictures here.
Or you can check it out in person at the open house this weekend, May 3, from 12-2 pm.
Unit #3: 3 bedrooms, 1 bath, 1400 square feet
- Sold in June 2002 for $288,000
- Sold in August 2004 for $325,000
- Was listed in March 2008 for $369,900
- Withdrawn
- Re-listed in April 2009 for $369,900
- Reduced
- Currently listed for $349,900
- Assessments of $200 a month
- Taxes of $4616
- Central Air
- Parking included
- Doesn’t look like there is an in-unit w/d
- Bedroom #1: 13×11
- Bedroom #2: 12×10
- Bedroom #3: 10×8
Kitchen window is gone? Not sure that was a good idea.
If it had a second bath, or even a half bath, I’d be seeing this place today.
But beyond college kids, who wants to have their guests/visitors use the same bathroom which they primarily use (and shower in)? I’m hardly a slob, but I don’t want anyone other than my spouse to use the bathroom that’s adjacent to our bedroom (i.e., a master bath). For that matter, I don’t want to use the equivalent of someone’s master bath when I’m a visitor in their home.
Nevermind….I guess there are still enough kitchen windows.
Only one bath in a 3 BR is still the big problem here.
Am I the only one who thinks it’s a bad idea to turn small apartment buildings into condos? My friend lives in a small building and one of the neighbors refuses to pay for even the simplest of repairs and never pays the assessments. My friend always ends up paying her neighbor’s share just so her place doesn’t fall apart. She could take the neighbor to court, but who wants to deal with that?
in this market, nothing will sell if it’s on the El. huge problem.
and what were they thinking with the placement of the dishwasher? if you are doing dishes at the sink, looks like you will have to step back in order to open the dishwasher door. lot’s of awkward leaning involved!
Did they seriously block off a window with their kitchen rehab? Wow, mental retardation runs deep.
Aside from that extremely poor decision, whats with the white cabinets? They must be “in” by the HGTV shrews as that was my ma’s last upgrade (in addition to granite countertops). Don’t people realize that they get dirty much easier?
Personally I like the old cabinets better, sure they are plain but they are functional. I don’t see the point in see through cabinets, nobody wants to see your pots and pans and Pam spray.
I hope they lose a boat to learn a harsh lesson that you don’t block off a $**$ window. But given its ppsf is reasonable if I had to guess I’d say 335k.
Shouldn’t the dishwasher have gone on the left of the sink. How will you be able to stand at the sink while the dishwasher door is open.
Why tear down cabinets and replace them with a mirror. I don’t need to look at myself in the kitchen, I need space to put my dinnerware. Not smart. And why do realtors/home sellers call a 10×8 space a bedroom?! Other than that, I like this place.
I just dont get how stoves end up in hallways/end of kitchens. I hope the person that buys this place does not have children.
Would I buy this place? No but the new kitchen is nice for some buyer.
At least they didn’t redo the kitchen and raise the price. Haha
10×8 is far from ideal for an adult’s full-time bedroom but perfectly functional as a small child or baby’s bedroom, or guest bedroom for that matter. that’s why they call it a bedroom.
I’m willing to bet that the big back porch in the last picture opens directly to the El tracks.
I would have liked to see the fridge and microwave set-up in the kitchen…
Who builds a 3/1? Hell turn one of the bedrooms into a bathroom and you’d probably have a lot more offers at that price.
‘Who builds a 3/1?’
-probably someone who’s been dead for about 100 years. This was never a gut rehab, just a vintage conversion of an apartment building. You can see the original wood moldings, door, built-ins, and the plaster crown molding.
This conversion looks like it did a great job of retaining a lot of vintage features and charecter. Unfortuneately, with that you get the vintage layout.
I live in what looks to be an extremely similar floorplan in a 2-flat greystone in Logan Square. I also have 3 bedrooms but just the 1 bath and agree that it would be great to have another bath. Problem is that the smallest bedroom is mostlikely in the front of the unit connected to the living room. So unless you’re looking for a master bath one the oposite side of the unit from the master bedroom, there no really good solution.
Also agree with the DW comments. Definitely should be to the left of the sink so as to not block the sink when the door is open. Maybe there is a legit reason like placement of electricity or ..nah, just bad planning.
Why the mirror. simple: mirror=$30, wall of cabinets=$300-500. Notice there is no hood for the stove. Classy
who builds a 3/1? ..umm everyone when that was built. that said its a huge handicap. buyers treat it more like a really big one bedroom. kitchen redo is cheap… that is like the cheapest range made that is not white. still a rental, but now a nicer rental. needs to be priced like it
See through cabinets are for display. Eliminates the need for a separate china cabinet.
The pillowcases as cabinet doors gave the old kitchen a nice touch. I hope they saved one since it looks like they still havent found a new door for the cabinet left of the D/W
i keep reading stuff in comments that i didnt catch when i looked at the pictures (except the missing windows). Pillow cases! some of you must be great a where’s waldo.
Sonies- I was thinking the same thing. If it’s worth the money they should turn that den into a bathroom.
Art- Do you think a family with small children is interested in purchasing a place where the oven is practically in the Hallway? They might as well get the paramedics on speed dial bc that’s an ugly accident waiting to happen.
I agree that only one bath is a huge deficit from a marketing/valuation standpoint. But I grew up in a 3 BR/ 1 bath house, 6 people, and somehow we survived. The first house I owned myself was 3/1 and I don’t recall only one bath being a major problem. Somebody will come along for whom this isn’t a big issue and probably get a good deal on this.
Is that a refrigerator or a pantry cabinet in front of the old window? Either way, the door opens from the left instead of the right. Terrible work flow!
lauren – you’re right, the stove’s position is poor. they had a great opportunity to change its location during the rehab but did not quite think the whole project through, as evidenced by the loss of a window and addition of a mirror. i actually like the cabinets though (from a distance at least). it makes a change from the standard maple/cherry.
To ‘Jenny’, no one needs to pay other unit’s assessments. The assoc has the power to place a lien & force a sale if assessments are not paid. Individual owners do not have the burden of taking the delinquent owner to court. That is the assoc’s job, actually that is their duty.
number one reason ranges dont move in a renovation is someone doesn’t want to move the gas line as that may involve talking to the association to shut off the gas and hiring a professional. dishwashers are pretty easy to locate given the large amount of drain hose they come with – the placement here seems really bad. anyone else notice the counter seems to be pieced together out of 12″ tile? the tile and range not moving totally say “diy” or hack renovators
The association sues, but it’s not hard for the “victim” to affix blame in a 3 or 4 unit association. Probably uglier than suing a sfh neighor alone, seeing as common areas must be shared.
It looks like they also replaced the flooring in the kitchen with hardwood, as well as in the adjacent room.
Nice unit with great crown moldings and details in the living room. The listing mentions a family room. The tracks are a problem though.
Would you rather have more cabinet space or a view of a brick wall? I’m not a big sun/windows person so I am fine with what they did, though I know I am in the minority. I would easily buy a garden unit or duplex down… i’m a cave dweller. 🙂
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0205/feature7/index.html
“When Chicago’s elevated trains rattle the windows, Lincoln Park neighbors just smile at each other, wave to the commuters, and return to their flower boxes and upscale cafés.
You get used to the noise, John and Polly Kelly are telling me one afternoon, as the first tie-loosing commuters trickle into their trackside Webster Avenue pub. And indeed, a quick scan of the room, all aging sports photos and dark wood trim, reveals no one showing much aversion to the recurring din. One of the neighborhood’s three train stops, at Armitage, lies two blocks south; another, at Fullerton, two blocks north. In a three-square-mile (eight-square-kilometer) zip code, that’s a lot of stops. What you do here in between them, they say, whenever a train passes, is sip your beer, feel the vibrations, and think of what to say next…”
From the same article:
“It’s really not bad here,” Johnson says. In the house the sound might equal the sound of a loud vacuum cleaner. Johnson taught his kids to cover their ears when playing outside. “When I bought this place, I got maybe a 30 percent discount,” he adds. ”
Yeah, sounds great all right.
not everyone’s a pansy, what can I tell you. if you want peace and quiet, living at Armitage and Sheffield is not the place for you. but many of these complaints are just harebrained, it’s like the people who endless whine about the winter.
I tell ya what I wouldn’t want to be any closer to the EL than I am already, and my condo is probably at least 3/4 of a block away from the tracks. Its really noisy when you’re outside but if you’re inside its not bad at all and you hardly notice it. Then again i’m just on the brown/purple line, i’m sure its much noisier when there’s 4 tracks instead of 2.
McGee’s across the street has far better specials than Kelly’s pub. Yeah its a north face crowd but their wristband specials are among the best in the city.
Drop a porto potty in the hallway and *bam* you’ve got yourself a powder room. Turn up the stereo and you won’t hear the train. Problem solved.
Sonies:
I hear that too and I’m 18 floors up. It isn’t too bad. You get used to it. What bothers me though is that we get the noise and there isn’t a station right near by.
BTW, what kind of dog do you have in case we see you at the dog park? We are going to be in town tonight. We have a fawn colored greyhound. He’s very striking.
does north face crowd mean college kids or has mcgee’s changed?
“BTW, what kind of dog do you have in case we see you at the dog park? We are going to be in town tonight. We have a fawn colored greyhound. He’s very striking.”
I have two pitbull mixes, they are very small for pitties (35 and 45 lbs each) the small one is brindle and white, and the larger one is black and white. I won’t be at the park tonight (going to drinking on Lincoln lol) but I should be there tomorrow around noon, assuming it doesn’t rain!
We have a furniture delivery tomorrow around 11:00 so I’m not sure I can get out.
Everyone’s tolerance for noise is different. Just like everyone’s tolerance for the dentist, pain, the winter, etc… is different. It has nothing to do with being a “pansy.” Few people outside of neuroscientists understand that there are biological reasons for different thresholds of activation in the brain – which lead to different levels of tolerance for these noxious stimuli. Also, as evidenced by many modern medications, we can even alter our thresholds (specifically with things like anticonvulsants or benzos). By “activation” I am talking about neurons firing in response to a stimulus. Neurons are known have different thresholds or “trigger points.”
Personally, I would rather have my teeth drilled by a dentist for 5 hours while someone is scratching their nails on a chalkboard in the middle of -20 degree weather… than live by the el for 1 day. My tolerance for high frequency sounds is high (dentist drill, nails on chalkboard) as is my tolerance for cold. Hourly train noise? Forget it. I am sure if I had an fMRI while listening to the sound of the El running by, it would be clear that the regions associated with pain would activate… as it would in 60-80% of the population no doubt. The remainder can live by the el happily.
And, not everyone’s brain can “get used to it” either. The mechanism by which people acclimate to noxious stimuli has varying degrees of flexibility depending on the person’s (brain’s) ability to raise the threshold of activation naturally. The acclimation process is no different than developing drug tolerance. In general, people need more & more to affect them as tolerance develops over time. However, some people get hooked & need to escalate dosages quickly while others are very slow to develop tolerance. The same mechanism applies for “getting used to” el noise or other similar things. Some people will never be able to live in a cold, noisy, dark, (whatever) environment. The incorrect pop culture societal expectation that they should “get used to it” further undermines their ability to adjust as well.
Our society has decided to place labels such as “high maintenance” and “picky” on what is really a neurological phenomenon that can be easily demonstrated empirically. In fact, loud noises were one of the very first stimuli ever used to demonstrate (in fMRI) where the brain activates during the fight or flight response…and these stimuli were used for a reason.
Mess are you high?
was there a point buried in that claptrap? if you don’t like the noise of the train that’s fine, many don’t – the point is that many people clearly see it as no big deal.
lol. no…not high. well, maybe a little. i am in the middle of grading 200 cognitive psych finals and forgot where i was for a minute. that post was a neuroscience payback for all the macroeconomic ramblings i have to read here. 😉 sorry if it wasn’t very clear.
skeptic, my point was that people who use words like “pansy” to describe those who are sensitive to noise are just uneducated about how the brain works and processes noise/pain signals. i don’t expect normal people to know this kind of thing…but i don’t think my explanation was that unclear. ask me follow up questions. i’m happy to answer.
Hate the kitchen remodel job. Upper cabinets hang over the sink, so you can smack your head when you’re cooking or cleaning, you have to play Tetris to get the dishwasher open and oven placement is a safety hazard. I know it costs money to move gas and water plumbing around, but it so would have been worth it.
Cabinets might be the Lindingo line from Ikea. Nothing against Ikea cabs, mind you.
reduced to $328k
I’m guessing this will go under K and close around 310 in the next few months
Oh god this place… NO!