Are Garden Units a Good Deal? A 2-Bedroom at 2144 W. Concord in Bucktown
This 2-bedroom in the Concord Flats at 2144 W. Concord in Bucktown recently came on the market.
This building was built in 1912 and has 8 units.
It’s a “G” unit, which means it’s a garden unit, but the listing says it’s “only” 3 steps down.
It has south and west exposures.
There’s hardwood floors in the main living areas, exposed brick and crown molding.
The kitchen has wood cabinets, stainless steel appliances and granite counter tops with a tile backsplash.
There’s a full pantry.
The bathroom has a heated floor.
The unit also has 8 foot doors and canned lighting.
It has most of the features buyers look for, including central air and washer/dryer in the unit. However, there’s no deeded parking. It’s on-street only.
This unit is just 2 blocks from the Damen blue line stop and all the hot restaurants of Bucktown and Wicker Park.
Is this a good starter apartment for someone looking to buy their first place in this neighborhood?
Jill Silverstein at Dream Town has the listing. See the pictures here.
Unit #G: 2 bedrooms, 1 bath, no square footage listed
- Sold in August 2007 for $280,000
- Sold in November 2009 for $280,000
- Currently listed for $315,000
- Assessments of $184 a month (includes exterior maintenance, scavenger, and snow removal)
- Taxes of $5607
- Central Air
- Washer/dryer in the unit
- No parking- on street permit parking only
- Bedroom #1: 12×11
- Bedroom #2: 10×10
- Living room: 18×13
- Kitchen: 11×10
FWIW, I’ve noticed the majority of my clients who bought garden units have a tough time selling them. In fact, when I look back at borrowers I’ve dealt with who had value issues or were underwater by a lot, it almost always was a garden unit condo.
UNDERWATER IN MORE WAYS THAN ONE LOLZ!!!!
INDOOR PORCH-PIT LOL!!!
GO CUBBIES!!!!!!!
garden units are for renting for like a year until you realize that they suck balls and you move out
also anon, I need you to tell me how tall that door entrance is!! count the bricks pls
It’s sold two times for $280K. Why not make it three?
Garden units: The pinnacle of external obsolesce.
Realtors always warned me that with garden units you get the deal (price & location) on the front end but selling it can take significantly longer. Even from an investor standpoint I can’t see how garden units make sense unless they cash flow significantly enough after offsetting the higher turnover costs you’re bound to have (see sonies comment).
My wife and I lived on a first floor unit and always had to deal with silverfish, can’t imagine what it was like in the garden unit below us. Ugh.
When you need bars on your windows its probably a sign of a questionable buy…
Garden units make sense for some lifestyles. My SO and myself have a ton of bikes and being able to walk out the door without having to go up/down a ton of stairs is a plus. The people walking by and peering into your living room and the ants are not.
External obsolescence*
the garden units at my old condo was on ground level, i.e. you walk into the lobby door and the doors were right there. This apparently confused people when I told them I was in unit 2 because they would walk up one flight of stairs and knock on my neighbors door. I eventually had to tell everyone to walk up two flights of stairs because apparently I don’t have the smartest friends in the world.
My last place was originally G, 1, 2, 3, and that’s what ComEd has them as, but the developer changed it to 1, 2, 3, 4. Caused endless issues with ComEd who kept reverting to the old way after supposedly having it fixed, so bills got screwed up.
My thought about garden units is basically similar to parking or being on a busier street, you sell it cheaper, but you also get to buy it cheaper, so it’s a wash if you can deal with it taking a bit longer to sell. Also depends on whether you’d be willing to live in a garden, of course.
“My last place was originally G, 1, 2, 3, and that’s what ComEd has them as, but the developer changed it to 1, 2, 3, 4. Caused endless issues with ComEd who kept reverting to the old way after supposedly having it fixed, so bills got screwed up.”
I had this exact same problem. Had my power cut off once because of it.
“I need you to tell me how tall that door entrance is!! count the bricks pls”
Looks like ~36 bricks from floor to ceiling, so right about 9′. Front door might be as little as 80″, or as much as 88″, but almost certainly in that range. Pix do seem to make it look lower/shorter than that.
“Looks like ~36 bricks from floor to ceiling, so right about 9?. Front door might be as little as 80?, or as much as 88?, but almost certainly in that range. Pix do seem to make it look lower/shorter than that.”
icky, would you please go do a site visit to verify? I’ll tip your patreon account or buy groove/@fo a two fer so they’ll go fix your deck rail, your pick.
@DZ is the reason you cannot do it because it is less than 500 ft from the nearest school?
I toured this building last month, the 2/2 on the first floor. This is a great street and quite location. The south exposure gets baked out all day. With that said, I still don’t think I could ever live in a garden unit again.
Nice-looking building. Too bad it’s a garden unit. I’d like to see how the others look. Great location.
You are paying over $2k a month to live in a 2 bed 1 bath place in a basement. Even if you were willing to live in a basement, that just doesn’t make any sense. HOA and Taxes just keep going up and who knows what is going on with mortgage deductions. I have a friend who has a gorgeous 2/2 duplex up in WP for rent for $2000. I just don’t see any upside to buying this at this price.
The taxes on this place are ridiculous. I agree with GoneFishin. $5,600 a year in taxes for a basement apartment? Crazy. That’s almost half what I pay for a 5 BR house on the North Shore worth at least three times what this place ought to go for.
nice building and location, very cool somewhat hidden block. considered buying in this building in 2009 but passed it up for a fixer upper. worked well for us in long run but I believe we would have enjoyed living here.
“HOA and Taxes just keep going up and who knows what is going on with mortgage deductions.”
Actually we DO know what is going on with mortgage deductions, unless it is changed by the Congress in the future.
If you have a mortgage under $750,000, it’s still deductible for a personal residence. Only the upper middle class took the deduction, though, because they’re the ones with $1,500+ monthly payments.
State and local taxes are limited to $10,000 total, however. So if your property taxes are over $10,000, you won’t get to deduct it all. This will really impact those buying that $500,000 in, say, Oak Park and Evanston, which have high taxes.
“So if your property taxes are over $10,000, you won’t get to deduct it all”
If you’re paying over $10k in property taxes, I hope you’re paying at least $5k in state income taxes, too. Which makes it worse.
Closed Aug-24 for $272,500.
A like for like loss from the post-bust Nov-09 sale at $280k.
anon (tfo): November 2009 isn’t “post-bust.”
It would be a post-bust loss if they sold for $280,000 in 2012-2018 and then it just resold for $272,500.
Still a loss for owning nearly 10 years. Ouch.
“November 2009 isn’t “post-bust.””
Case Shiller Chicago Condo top = Mar-07 at 162.65
Case Shiller Chicago Condo low since Mar-07 = Apr-12 at 101.36
Case Shiller Chicago Condo Nov-09 = 133.15.
Didn’t say post-bottom, or at bottom, but if you want to interpret “post-bust” to mean after the bottom, I guess you’re entitled to be confusing. When was any given stock market bust? When there was a the big downturn, or at the bottom thereafter? Was it Oct-29, or Jun-32?
Nov-09 was after the official recession ended. There was a lot more down to go, but it was after the ‘bust’.
“Didn’t say post-bottom, or at bottom, but if you want to interpret “post-bust” to mean after the bottom, I guess you’re entitled to be confusing.”
My god anon (tfo). Really???? You’re going to actually argue with me from your own evidence that Nov 2009 when Case Shiller was at 133 that THAT was “post-bust” (as you put it?) So what’s post bust then? The day after the peak? at 161.65???
Ba ha ha ha! So laughable.
Come on. You were wrong with your use of “post-bust.” That property was NOT post-bust.
A bust ends when it bottoms. Was 2001 the end of the stock market dot-com bust or was it 2003? Duh.
A “crash” is the initial decline. And, in fact, as you know, housing prices in Chicago didn’t even fall much in the original recession quarters which is why many people on this very blog were arguing with me throughout all of 2009 that “Lincoln Park prices will never go down”. The price declines lasted YEARS (as you know.) To be “post” something means you are in that AFTER the worst has passed.
A “recession”, where two quarters of GDP declines, has NOTHING to do with the housing bust. Absolutely nothing. Housing bust lasted until 2012. Just like dot-com bust lasted until 2003. Yes- just like the stock market bust of the Great Depression lasted past 1929.
Come on.
Give it up.
At least find some properties that are truly after the bust. I haven’t found many, so far. The last 5 years have been good to most who bought in the GreenZone. Prices HAVE risen, for the most part. But that might be starting to change now.
“A bust ends when it bottoms.”
Whatever. So a bust is the same as a bear market to you.
I have *truly* never heard anyone describe it that what before, but I shouldn’t be surprised. Both with the weird usage, and the goalpost moving.
“At least find some properties that are truly after the bust. I haven’t found many, ”
I did. And you’ve already backtracked from your confident assertion of none in the last 4-5 years.
“I haven’t cribbed about an apple-to-apple loss on a GreenZone property in a LONG time. Probably since the 2012-2013 era.”
That’s what you wrote.
This is a like for like property, sold at a loss, on a GZ property, from April of this year.
And, since you referenced 2012, you could not have plausibly intended that to relate only to post-bottom, since, as you also note, the bottom was in 2012. OF COURSE there were like for like losers in 2012–the market was still going down in spots.
“This is a like for like property, sold at a loss, on a GZ property, from April of this year.”
The property you posted the updated sale for was NOT last sold in the post-bust era. That’s all I was saying. I didn’t say all of the properties you posted the sales price on was that.
But what I said was correct. I haven’t cribbed on an apple-to-apple loss since I covered the unit in the post on Wolfram since the bust period. I used to do the update posts on how much lower the properties sold for all the time in the bust period.
As is obvious, I haven’t done an update crib on this garden unit at 2144 W. Concord (or any of the others you gave the sales data for.)
So, yeah, I haven’t cribbed about an apple-to-apple loss on a GreenZone property in a LONG time. Probably since the 2012-2013 era. That’s 100% accurate. But it’s starting to happen again.
The market is changing people. You cannot buy and hold for 3-5 years and expect to sell for more anymore.
“And you’ve already backtracked from your confident assertion of none in the last 4-5 years.”
Sigh.
I have not cribbed on an apple-to-apple loss since the worst of times- in 2012-2013. There haven’t been any losses to do it on. Prices keep going up. So, no, I’m not backtracking.
Please go back and find the blog post where I cribbed on a closed property where they took a loss after posting on them previously. Did I post on 2144 W. Concord twice? No. Nor did I post a second post on ANY of the other properties you found.
Oh, ok, so you didn’t do any tracking and that was the first one you noticed.
“But it’s starting to happen again.”
What, that you’re doing follow-up posts? Your point is that you hadn’t done a follow up post with a loss, notwithstanding that they may have happened, and now you are? Is that accurate?