Lincoln Park Rowhouse Reduces Again: 2545 N. Burling
We last chattered about this 5-bedroom rowhouse at 2545 N. Burling in Lincoln Park in February 2009.
See our February chatter here.
It is still on the market and has been reduced another $150,000.
In the winter, the seller was offering a $10,000 purchasers credit if under contract by the end of January 2009. Now, the listing says the lower level could be 2-bedroom rental or live-in quarters.
Mary Beth Smith at Rubloff still has the listing. See the pictures and a virtual tour here.
2454 N. Burling: 5 bedrooms, 3.5 baths, no square footage listed, 2 car garage
- Sold in May 1999 for $1.13 million
- Sold in July 2003 for $1.55 million
- Was listed for $1.599 million
- Reduced
- Was listed in February 2009 for $1.499 million
- Reduced
- Currently listed for $1.349 million
- Taxes of $20,641
- Central Air
what?! prices in LP going down? forbes may have it right?
this is just one in a many high-dollar Chicago properties that need to be marked down to move. fortunately this one doesn’t have problems like some of the listings i have personally looked at (e.g. sky high assessments, bedrooms w/ no closets, and in need of a total gut rehab).
I wonder if Steve will be around today and what his comments will be.
It is interesting that when challenged about the market, the brokers’ pitch has changed from “This is LP and prices have not fallen and will not fall” to “We’ve seen price declines of about 3%-5%, but LP is much more stable than all other areas of the city and we don’t expect prices to fall much more.”
I cannot wait to see what they are saying next year!
Generally Chicago residential real estate taxes are quite low for non new construction, even for high-end properties. This rowhouse’s tax bill seems high. We have friends in Lincoln Park who also own a vintage gut-rehab rowhouse of this caliber, and their taxes are about half this amount.
Nice home. Empty state suggests a “distressed homeowner” situation, and I’m surprised owner didn’t rent furniture and do staging.
White-collar job market here continues to decline, even further reducing pool of potential buyers at this $1m+ price-point. Homes in our area have been reduced by more than $250,000, without sales occurring – four houses on our block alone.
Case-Shiller came out today and Chicagoland is relative flat for April. In fact most of the country showed some signs of stabilization–while 12 out of the 20 cities surveyed showed declines on a month over month basis, eight of these were less than 1%. Las Vegas, NYC, Miami and Phoenix all lead the declines.
Eight areas showed gains, most significantly Dallas (+1.8%), Cleveland (1.3%) & Denver (+1.5%)..
The MacroMarkets major metro housing shares start trading today – UMM (up) and DMM (down). Should be interesting.
This is what Steve said in February (from the February thread):
“I have walked this property and here are my thoughts – This is basically a narrow and dark 3 bed, 2.5 bath with an additional 2 beds in the basement. Burling is a nice street but this property is in a bad school district. The south half of Burling is in Lincoln School District and the north end is in Alcott. Maybe someone bought it using comps from the south end of the street (bad broker?).”
“Now, the listing says the lower level could be 2-bedroom rental or live-in quarters.”
For anyone who has actually seen this property, is it actually practical to use the lower level as a rental. Are the 2 seperate entrances to this unit, seperate gas & electric meters, HVAC systems, kitchen or bath. Since the ‘rental unit’ concept is a recent addition to the listing description, I get the feeling that this is a ploy: There could be a rental, if there was some significant alterations and construction.
Also, are buyers at this price range interested in having tenants. I own/live in a 3-flat so it bother me personally. But if I was buying a $1MM+ property, I would want the added privacy and wouldn’t want to deal with tenants on site.
Regarding general housing prices. UMM is trading at around $20 per share. That implies further housing price depreciation of about 6.7% over the next 5 years – if I understand the instrument properly. I need to call Macromarkets to clarify a few points.
Don’t be deceived by April C-S. Things may look stable to slight uptick through the summer, but the deflation cycle is far from over.
Re: Taxes—Assessor sez that the property is 3 apartments and 4081 SF. Given the footprint of the building (about 1500sf), that MUST count basement area, which would be excluded from assessment number if not an apartment. So, if you used this as a SFH and appealed the assessment, you’d have a slam dunk reduction in taxes.
Re: “a “distressed homeowner” situation”–the property does not have a mortgage on it. Acquisition financing and second mtg were both released in 11-08.
This home is no longer on the market. It is listed on the MLS as contingent as of today.
Contingent means little these days due to the difficulty of obtaining jumbo financing. I’ll believe it when its closed.
I thought that discrimnation laws prevented info such as “Close to St. Clements and playlot” – close to St Clement suggests (horror) closeness to a catholic church and school and playlot suggests (abomination) that a 5 BR family house might be handy for a family with kids.
I walked through this place. Motivated seller (as is reflected in the price). Personally not my taste but i can see why someone would snap it up at this price. Pictures are deceiving… this needs a lot of updating.
“Personally not my taste … this needs a lot of updating”
Given the not your taste (nor mine, based on the pics) qualification, what “needs” updating? Are you talking decorating-type updating or fixtures/mechanicals?
“Given the not your taste (nor mine, based on the pics) qualification, what “needs” updating?”
lower level: needs to be completely redone.
upper level: pictures do not show some bathrooms/bedrooms in rather poor condition. kitchen definitely needs updating.
Interesting article that supports the thesis that the city might hold up better than the burbs:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124641839713978195.html
I’d live in Lake Forest over Avondale any day of the week.
Sold for $1.234MM on 8/24/09.