Similiar Vintage Rowhouse But in West Lakeview: 1920 W. Wolfram
How much of a “deal” was 1469 W. Foster, the 4-bedroom rowhouse in Andersonville we just chattered about?
This 3-bedroom rowhouse at 1920 W. Wolfram in West Lakeview was built in the same year: 1892.
The layout is similar with the narrow living space (the livingroom is 17×11.)
It has 3 bedrooms, instead of 4, and they’re also similar in size to the Foster rowhouse:
- 16×16
- 12×8
- 11×10
This rowhouse has a finished basement and 2.5 baths. It also has a 1.5 garage.
How much more would you pay to live a few miles south in West Lakeview?
Charlie Vernon at Baird and Warner has the listing. See the pictures here.
1920 W. Wolfram: 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, 1.5 garage, no square footage listed
- Sold in March 1997 for $255,000
- Sold in October 1999 for $322,500
- Sold in October 2003 for $422,000
- Was listed in February 2009 for $567,300
- Reduced
- Currently listed for $535,000
- Taxes of $6,753
- Central Air
- Woodburning fireplace
Taxes are nuts. I don’t like this place.
The Foster house is still a better deal.
Location matters and the uptown location discussed yesterday definitely has some advantages over this property. At this property, you are about a block away from a HUGE public housing complex. You are on the right side of the tracks, so to speak, but it still isn’t the greatest area. Plus, you are missing many of the amenities of city living over there and are forced to drive for most of your needs. Not a huge deal to many, I’m sure, but I’d vastly prefer the Uptown location.
yeah the other one is a better deal, why do they call it an end unit?
The Foster house was priced right or even slightly low. This is priced more than “slightly” too high. So sit on the MLS and collect dust it will.
You can get far better places in Lakeview for 535k than this place.
Deceptive, but true, it appears.
It is an end unit of the “Three Brownstone Rowhouses Circa 1892,” it just happens to appear to share a party wall with the non-“Three Brownstone Rowhouses Circa 1892” house to the east.
Regardless of the shortcomings of this particular location it will probably be “perceived” as better than AV. But the location premium in the current ask is not realistic. I think it would probably garner offers if listed at the 2003 price.
if seller hopes to sell, they need to clean up and declutter STAT.
I agree with all of the comments and wanted to add one about the importance of staging when listing a property.
To me, nothing turns me off more than an unkept place! I think if the owners do not take the time to make sure their house is in an immaculate condition when the agent drops in to take the pictures and also for any showings, then they probably haven’t taken care of the property either. Does anyone else feel this way as well or am I just too OCD about RE?
Other than that, the other problem is the location of this unit. An agent I have been working with has shown me several places in this area. He has advised me to stay east of Ashland as not many properties west of there are worth investing in at this point in time.
As of now, I am staying south of Belmont, east of Ashland and basically (for now) north of 290.
Any comments good or bad about my boundries?
Re JPS’s comment saying it would garner offers at the 2003 price, I was thinking more along the lines of the ’99 price to start a bidding war. Considering the house on Foster utilized that strategy and it worked, wouldn’t that be a good idea for this unit as well?
“it just happens to appear to share a party wall with the non-”Three Brownstone Rowhouses Circa 1892? house to the east”
No, it doesn’t. There is clearly a gap b/t the walls. Not that much besides water could fit b/t them, but not a party wall. Which might be worse, from a maintenance perspective, b/c if water can get in there, there will eventually be brickwork to be done, but no access.
The neighborhood schools are about a toss-up right now, with a slight edge to this property (altho I think both will get better, with the number of young kids in each ‘hood and reduced mobility). So that’s a big premium for ’57 v. ’40.
anon, I’m curious where you see the gap? There appears to be one in the agent’s front pic, but maybe that is just facade alignment or setback? Three different aerial sources I checked are not clear or seem to show only one parapet wall shared by the two. I guess they could be capped together?
Just curious since you don’t get these wrong.
“anon, I’m curious where you see the gap?”
Could be wrong, but it looks like a double wall to me–check the width of the wall cap v the width of the wall cap on the west end of the 3 units. And if they were built at different times (which they certainly appear to be), there should be two walls, though there probably is a party wall agreement governing the wall cap and what happens if there’s a problem, although in 1892, perhaps they thought that neighbors would be neighborly about a mutual problem. Double wall is better for fire, sound and insulation, worse if maintenance is needed.
Should have said “not a ‘true’ party wall” in the first post.
“there will eventually be brickwork to be done, but no access.”
This is something I’ve wondered about, regardless of whether it actually applies to this particular property. When you have a brick wall that is literally inches away from the neighboring structure, with no prospect of a person getting in betweeen the buildings, how do you maintain the brick?
And if the answer is “you don’t”, is that a strong reason not to purchase a building with this situation unless the non-accessible brick happens to be brand new?
“how do you maintain the brick?”
The answer *is* “you don’t”. I’d almost feel better with old brick, so long as both buildings were about the same vintage (so that the wall wasn’t long direct exposure), b/c of how shoddily built many modern brick building are.
Eventually your interior wall suffers enough water damage that you need to tear out the plaster and rebuild/tuck-point exterior wall from inside and reconstruct interior finishes. That’s why it’s important to maintain parapet wall and parapet cap integrity. If unit already has a drywall wall, then perhaps this work was already done, or drywall was placed over failing plaster (quick fix but wrong approach).
Unit needs a good cleaning and staging. It’s very cluttered, which will make prospective buyers even more concerned about relative small size, etc.
Even if the place we saw yesterday in Andersonville was priced the same as this one, I’d rather have the place in Andersonville. It’s close to the train and near good shopping and food. Definitely a very good location for anyone who wants to save money by being a one-car household. This place in west lakeview is way too far from the train and way too close to the projects. Plus, if you want a cheap single family home and don’t mind living in this area, you could just buy one of the many places for sale in that gated subdivision thing near the metra tracks. I think this is also the ‘hood where there is currently a very dumpy two flat for sale for under 200K.
Fyi those “projects” are at about half capacity and are for senior citizens.
I don’t care if the housing development is full of rainbows and kittens. It’s ugly and it’ll make the house harder to resell than the house in Andersonville. With that said, the CHA site is really a minor issue for me in comparison to the lack of a nearby el stop.
“you could just buy one of the many places for sale in that gated subdivision thing near the metra tracks. ”
I think you mean the stuff to the east of here, which used to be the site of the old Stewart-Warner plant…
What anon is talking about maybe the Lathrop Homes? Which are not exclusively for seniors, except for the highrise, and which are very much at like half capacity or less at this point. Wonder how long they’ll decline, since it’ll be a decade or two before they get that project torn down and sold off.
As an aside, I’d LOVE to have a house on the Chicago River, like there are up north of here.
“Fyi those “projects” are at about half capacity ”
True. And scheduled for demolition, which I wouldn’t count on happening soon, now.
“and are for senior citizens”
Not true. The high rise(s?) south of Diversey (which aren’t going anywhere) are Senior housing.
The low-rise Lathrop homes north of Diversey and south of Wellington b/t Clybourn and the river, are family housing. Think I’m wrong? Drive by about 6pm on the first hot summer day. They are on the demo list, but I think that the “plan for transformation” is going to get bogged down b/c of the economy and the RE market.
I didn’t know the Lathrop homes were coming down as well. That will likely give this area investment potential in the long term, IMO.
Outside of CHA issues, though, I still don’t think this is much of a neighborhood. Especially compared to the relatively vibrant hood around the place on Foster.
I don’t think this is a comparable property since there’s two full and one half bath and the other one was 1.5 baths. Also this property seems a lot larger than the other house and isn’t this actually in Roscoe Village?
“isn’t this actually in Roscoe Village?”
Too far south. Hamlin Park is more accurate.
This is North Center. It is not West Lakeview. This is actually quite interesting because I’m convinced that many of the people who live in this area think they live in Lakeview. In addition, the listing is correctly placed in North Center but the descriptors say Lakeview.
“This is North Center. It is not West Lakeview.”
Agreed. The dividing line is Ravenswood; Same for dividing [greater] Lincoln Square from Uptown and Edgewater.
But, confusion is understandable: (1) The neighborhood organization is Hamlin Park Neighbors, which is under the umbrella of The Lake View Citizens Council and (2) it *is* in Lake View Township–the town of Lake View was Diversey to Devon and the lake to Western–and tax assessments say as much.
And it still isn’t Roscoe Village.