Get a 5,000 Sq Ft Hyde Park Penthouse for Under $400,000: 5490 S. South Shore
This 6-bedroom vintage penthouse in the Jackson Shore Apartments at 5490 S. South Shore in Hyde Park came on the market in May 2019.
Jackson Shore Apartments was designed by Rapp & Rapp in 1917. It was the first tall luxury building in East Hyde Park.
It’s a co-op.
The 21 units were designed to be like single family homes and are over 5,000 square feet each.
It has a 24-hour doorman. There’s no parking but there is an exercise room.
This unit is the sister unit to #10S which we already chattered about in 2019 as it remains on the market as well.
It is currently listed at $645,000.
You can see that August 2019 chatter here.
#10N has some of its original features including hardwood floors, original plaster moldings and a wood burning fireplace in the living room.
Just like #10S, it also has a 20×20 circular heated sunroom.
This property has washer/dryer hook-ups in the unit but no central air.
The listing describes all the bathrooms as “vintage” and there are no pictures of the kitchen at all.
Originally listed in May 2019 for $575,000, it has been reduced to $399,500.
The HOAs of $6409 a month include the property taxes. This building only has 21 units. The residents have to split the costs of manning 24-hour front door coverage which isn’t cheap.
At what price will someone finally take a chance on this penthouse?
Robert Sullivan at Berkshire Hathaway KoenigRubloff has the listing. See the pictures here.
Unit #10N: 6 bedrooms, 3.5 baths, 5000 square feet
- I couldn’t find a prior sales price as it’s a co-op
- Originally listed in May 2019 for $575,000
- Reduced several times
- Currently listed at $399,500
- Assessments of $6409 a month (includes heat, property taxes, doorman, exterior maintenance, lawn care, scavenger, snow removal)
- Taxes are included in the HOA
- No central air
- Washer/dryer hook-ups in the unit
- Wood burning fireplace
- Bedroom #1: 16×20
- Bedroom #2: 13×20
- Bedroom #3: 15×15
- Bedroom #4: 15×15
- Bedroom #5: 10×16
- Bedroom #6: 9×12
- Florida room: 19×20
- Foyer: 12×15
Needs another 150-200k just to get it up date and then you still have to pay for parking and have no central AC in the summer. Then the pleasure of paying $6400/month in assessments in a building that barely has any amenities that buyers want these days. Can’t rent it out or Airbnb so you’ll need to sell if you lose your job or need to relocate. That’s gonna be a no for me, dawg.
Who is the buyer pool for a money pit like this? I wouldn’t even take it for $200k.
The problem with this unit remains….who can afford to pay $6,400/mo on this property…that comes out to $77k a year. If you can afford that you can buy a much better property.
“the costs of manning 24-hour front door coverage”
So, that’s 4.5 FTE, right? If they contract with a service, that’s still probably $25/hr, or ~$220k/year, and probably at least 50% more than that if they actually hire their own guys.
So, basically $1,000 per month per unit for the doormen.
“The enormous kitchen offers enough space to create an extraordinary design that will satisfy the most discerning cook. ”
That’s probably $100k of work, just to make it financeable.
“Co-op Annual Tax Deduction: $18,842”
So, it’s taxed as if assessed at ~$1,000,000. Without a usable kitchen.
With experience I say adding a Unico/SpacePak system to this unit would run about $25-30k installed. I challenge anyone to say that this couldn’t be an insanely nice place especially with views, size and original details. You’d have to want to be in Hyde Park though and plenty of people do.
I’ve done the math on places like this and you have to consider that the alternative 5000 sq ft, nice vintage place in Hyde Park is say a 1.5M+ single family home and that will still have $25-30K tax bill and exterior and yard maintenance as well. Putting 30% for a down payment on a jumbo you are 500K out of pocket and have a big mortgage payment.
Alternately, in the co-op and assuming they allow financing, you are only out of pocket for down payment $100-120K. Putting the $400k savings in the market at a 7% return will generate about $28k per year. Quite an offset and you only have a tiny mortgage payment to make as well.
For the person who likes living in an apartment, the Co-Op with low buy-in and high expenses, will actually be significantly cheaper to live in. Not intuitive and I’m sure that’s why these units sit.
If you could actually rent this place out it would be cash flow negative at any price. My preliminary search of rentals in HP shows several 4/5BR places right here for under $5k / mo. If we assume the taxes / assessments rise in line with rent inflation and the current rent for this place is under $6400 then this place will NEVER be cash flow positive. Ie its market price is zero. Lets say the rent is $7k instead. Thats a whopping $7200 in profit per year on this place for all the work you would put in finding and servicing a renter. Even beautiful co-ops in LP aren’t selling. I don’t know what the future holds for this building. They need to look at their costs and see if they can get their monthlies down to a reasonable level. I wonder how many of the 21 units are current on their monthly payments…
AC:
“the Co-Op with low buy-in and high expenses, will actually be significantly cheaper to live in. Not intuitive and I’m sure that’s why these units sit.”
It depends on how high the expenses are. In this location it makes ZERO sense to pay $6400 / month because the rental alternatives are much cheaper. In LP where the equivalent rent is $12k / month it is justified if the price is low enough. Also – with a co-op you have no way to sell to a financial buyer (ie investor) who are the buyers of last resort. They will not be able to rent it even if its profitable. So even when all things are equivalent price wise a co-op should still trade at a discount.
These do feel cheap compared to north side residences. If the scouthside fixed their crime problem (I assume not as much in this direct neighborhood) these could be huge long term steals. Something this size would run 12-15 a month anywhere north of the loop. With UC nearby if they could ever develop similar to neighborhoods around Harvard etc this could be a fantastic bargain.
FWIW a modern full amenity apartment that’s about 1800 sq ft would run around 7k in river north, Gold Coast, etc. and if you ever look at rents near Harvard you would see 800 sq ft going for 4K a month. You may say that would never happen but there’s a retired nyc detective whose worth half a billion because he bought up a ton of real estate at giveaway prices in the Bronx that is now worth a ton (was a Bloomberg article a few months back).
I wonder how many units sit empty in this building because people can’t pay the HOA? I mean, the penthouse HOA is probably a lot higher than the rest, but even if the others are half as much, not many would want to pay $3,000 a month.
“I wonder how many units sit empty in this building because people can’t pay the HOA?”
Like a lot of co-ops, they likely screen prospective owners well so that this doesn’t happen.
But it seems that some of these owners have lived in the units for decades, as well.
“With UC nearby if they could ever develop similar to neighborhoods around Harvard etc this could be a fantastic bargain.”
It’s a gorgeous neighborhood with million dollar houses nearby. The new Trader Joe’s is going in just a few blocks away.
There are co-ops that are just as run down on the north side. Some have sold for under $200,000 in the past, although they weren’t 5000 square feet. Lol.
Any building with just 20 units and a doorman is going to struggle simply because of the costs. 24/7 doormen are a HUGE expense and then you have the maintenance of this 100 year old building, again, with just 20 owners.
If you had a 100 year old house, how much would you need to do to it to maintain it? It’s not cheap. New wiring, plumbing, windows, decking, roof, windows, driveway, garage etc.
Someone once mentioned on here how expensive it was in some of these co-op buildings to even clean the fireplaces. These are wood burning! They have to maintain that on both sides of the building (each of the two units per floor have one fireplace each.)
Now we know why One Bennett Park doesn’t have wood burning fireplaces in each unit. Lol.
“They need to look at their costs and see if they can get their monthlies down to a reasonable level.”
If they got rid of the full time doormen, they would save thousands each. Think about what you have to pay each of them and there would be several since you have to have weekend staff, overnight staff and regular day staff. And you have to pay benefits like health insurance as well.
I would assume most of the monthly assessment outside of property taxes goes to the door staff.
“So, basically $1,000 per month per unit for the doormen.”
I would guess way more than that. Way more. You have health/dental insurance and vacation/sick days.
I don’t know anyone who contracts out their doormen. Can anyone speak to this? Doormen are particularly loyal. They make connections with the residents. You want them working for YOU, not some contracting service. That way, they know they’ll get a nice end of the year bonus.
Some buildings have been known to “steal” doormen. You don’t want them stealing yours. No, this is not contracted out.
The building I lived in in River North contracted out the front door staff. The contract was for $140,000/yr. The people actually working the front door were living in poverty. One of them commented that the penthouse unit in the building rented out for more a month than they made in a year. Something like $12k.
The majority of people in this building are rich (or the very top of upper middle, very top) and persnickety. And to make a correction, this is one of two top floor units, not a “penthouse”.
I got a chuckle at the crime comment since rehabs and new construction between Woodlawn and downtown are now selling for 500-600k. Grand Boulevard has skyrocketed in price over the past couple years.
Per FG “….since rehabs and new construction between Woodlawn and downtown are now selling for 500-600k…”
I’d add as a fwiw re south side pricing that rehabbed bungalows in Beverly have recently sold between $450-$550k.
“The building I lived in in River North contracted out the front door staff.”
Thanks Fred. Why don’t they leave? Best job market in 20 years. There’s no reason to make poverty level for that job.
At some of my friends buildings the doormen have been there for 25 years so I’m assuming they get paid well. I think they’re also unionized so that makes a big difference too.
“Thanks Fred. Why don’t they leave? Best job market in 20 years. There’s no reason to make poverty level for that job.”
Only if you are white and educated (especially educated). If that were uniformly true we wouldn’t have droves of people driving for rideshare companies or the poverty in the south suburbs (or rural poverty)…
Doormen are unionized, though not paid well compared to other unions. I think the benefits are are big factor and very appealing to older, already retired from something else door men. Our building has both a retired postal worker and former CPS superintendent. I think I lot just like having something to do and enjoy the social aspects of the job. Lets me real, its mostly sitting around, reading and chatting.
One of these days the people in this building will “bite the bullet” and change it to a condo, for reasons too numerous to mention. Co-ops make no sense to 99% of home buyers nowadays; only that fabled “l%” sees value in them, and it’s mainly for reasons of “keeping the riff-raff out.” Not that it’s all that effective that way anymore; open-housing and non-discrimination laws apply to co-ops too.
Our doorpeople were union, and they were still poor.
We left the building a year and a half ago, so the economy wasn’t quite as good then. There was a mix of long-timers and a rotating cast of new people. Anytime a longer tenured person left, it took a year+ to find a new person who would last more than a few months. I made a point not to learn a new person’s name until they made 6 months on the job.
The work is easy and soul-crushingly boring. Many people who left couldn’t handle just how boring it was, especially the overnight shift. I imagine that is why it pays so little.
I imagine one of the draws of the job is the ease. Sure you could make more money flipping burgers, but you likely also have to work MUCH harder.
“Our doorpeople were union, and they were still poor.”
Sorry to hear it Fred. That’s a really crappy building. Buyers should be looking at the doormen before buying then.
I have a friend who’s doormen have been working at the building for 20+ years. And they rarely leave. Big difference than what you describe. So clearly that building pays a lot more.