Trying to Sell Just 2 Years Later: A Loft at 1800 W. Grace in North Center
This 2-bedroom loft in 1800 W. Grace in North Center recently came on the market.
If it looks familiar, that’s because we last chattered about it just 2 years ago, in 2015, when it was last on the market.
Back then, it was priced at nearly $1 million and would have been among the most expensive lofts to sell in North Center.
But, apparently, the neighborhood couldn’t support that high of a price and it ended up selling for $815,000.
You can see our chatter here.
This time around, the seller isn’t starting with the million dollar price point.
If you recall, this building was converted into lofts in 2008.
This loft has exposed brick, floor to ceiling windows and 18 foot concrete ceilings.
This unit has an expansive 60×5 terrace.
The living/dining room has white porcelain tiled floors.
The kitchen has modern cabinets with stone counter tops and luxury stainless steel appliances.
The bathrooms also have modern finishes.
The loft has central air, washer/dryer in the unit and a rare 2-car parking.
The listing says that $15,000 in electronic window shades were added in 2017.
It has come back on the market for only $34,000 more than the 2015 price at $849,000.
Will this sell quickly this time around?
Nancy Tassone at Jameson Sotheby’s has the listing this time. You can see the pictures here.
You can also see it at the Open House on Sunday, May 7 from 11 am to 1 pm.
Unit #508: 2 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, 2000 square feet
- Sold in May 2010 for $706,000 (included 2-car parking)
- Was listed in May 2015 at $995,000 (included 2-car parking)
- Sold in July 2015 for $815,000 (included the 2-car parking)
- Currently listed at $849,000 (includes the 2-car parking)
- Assessments now $667 a month (they were $619 a month in 2015)(includes cable, exercise room, exterior maintenance, lawn care, scavenger and snow removal)
- Taxes now $10,664 (they were $11,608 in 2015)
- Central Air
- Washer/Dryer in the unit
- Bedroom #1: 15×12
- Bedroom #2: 18×11
- Terrace: 60×5
Over 400 PSF to live right between both train lines that far north? I like this area but that’s a stretch.
I don’t like this area. I hate visiting friends who live here. It’s far from both Lake Shore Drive and the expressway, so you get stuck in neighborhood traffic no matter which way you go.
Yeah no kidding, who loves driving on western avenue, damen or addison, raise your hand
Yeah thought so…
They did a good job on the renovations IMO really freshens up an otherwise boring space
I like it but it is still only a two bed. At least it has floor to ceiling walls in the bedrooms. Anything starting with an “8” is too much however for this location.
LOL. CHOO CHOO TRAIN FAIL!!!
Still only 1665 sf of interior space.
Local school is Hamilton. Not as hot as Blaine to the east, or Bell to the west. Another reason why the price is a stretch.
when is the last time Sabrina featured a SFH here? is inventory that low?
“Local school is Hamilton.”
A reasonable point, but it’s an $800k 2 bedroom. It’s not the least likely sort of condo for a family with school aged kids, but it’s close.
What type of buyer will buy this place? Most people I know that live up here are families that move north for the schools. Most families need more than two bedrooms. Also, how can the redfin listing include two elementary schools when this condo is in Hamilton as vb said?
There are plenty of one child families that live in a 2 bedroom condos. I know a few. Although, most of them want a home office too and greatly desire a 3 bedroom single family home.
“There are plenty of one child families that live in a 2 bedroom condos”
In $800k condos, in North Center?
This is neither cheap, nor in a preferred location for a $800k 2 bed.
Were it $500k, sure. Were it in GC, sure.
This is one of 6 2 bed condos that are north of north, and asking 750-950. 3 are in the Grant Hospital condos, one is a Maud townhouse, and the 5th is this:
https://www.redfin.com/IL/Chicago/550-W-Wellington-Ave-60657/unit-5W/home/12597472
Which seems like a pretty nice alternative, and has the office area you mention. Trade off is no half bath, and 1 parking spot.
This area is great, if i was spending 1-1.5 million on a SFH. 800k for a 2 bed condo with about 1500 square feet living space? wth is the appeal here?
this is around 500 bucks per square foot in NORTH CENTER people. this is crazy.
“this is around 500 bucks per square foot in NORTH CENTER people. this is crazy.”
Is it?
The 2015 sale would seem to indicate it’s not.
I refuse to accept someone paid that much for this place. I’ll eat my shoe if this sells for anything over 700.
“when is the last time Sabrina featured a SFH here? is inventory that low?”
In North Center?
Or any neighborhood?
I love this condo, I love the kitchen, the bathrooms. I would never pay that much to live at Lincoln and Grace.
In addition to Hamilton there are 2 Catholic grade schools, St. Andrew’s and St. Benedict’s. There is also St. Ben’s high school but it’s planning to close and is taking on no new students as freshmen this year.
@Riz – the appeal of the area is the schools. If you don’t have school-age children, you are not the target market for this area of North Center. I agree this place is overpriced. But so is most of the housing stock around it. The support for the housing high prices is the schools.
@vb,
I totally understand that – but I think this price point is a bit too much for the area. i was looking for single family homes in decent school districts all year – and when I was looking you could get a decent SFH for around 1 mil in roscoe or north center…(not a mcmansion, but a decent one), and definitely a big townhouse for the 700k range..why would a family buy this loft? It looks like something that would be more in line for a young professional couple – who would buy this place, if it was in bucktown , lincoln park, west loop, or river north. I find it hard to believe a young family would want this place.
Sabrina, there are a lot of SFH under construction and for sale in the southport corridor, anywhere from $2 to $3+ million range. Not many in the <$2M range. Wondering if you can find any in that price range or it'd be nice to see what the cribchatters think about the construction/available homes in southport. For example: https://www.atproperties.com/9598242/1217-w-cornelia-avenue-chicago-illinois-60618-nei?ref=tinyatp&pt=68330598
“Sabrina, there are a lot of SFH under construction and for sale in the southport corridor, anywhere from $2 to $3+ million range.”
I’ve cribbed on many homes in Southport over the years. The recent new builds are all boring and pretty cookie cutter, to be honest. So I haven’t been covering any of that.
But I’ll start checking what’s going on in that neighborhood again.
I lived on the 1600 block of Grace for several years back prior to the Sourhport rise to prominence. It was a great quiet street with easy parking, good neighbors, and a nice safe urban vibe. It was back in the mid to late 90’s
The easy walk to Wrigley on game days impressed our friends but other than that nobody could understand why we lived west of Ashland. At one of our many parties my roommate and Were nicknamed Christopher Columbus for being such explorers of the new world.
Sometimes when I read the word ” green zone” I think back to my days at that apartment. Years later I was a fairly early adopter to the Fulton market. That was an awesome place to live back in 2004 but I guess the seceret finally got out.
Yeah, we moved to Andersonville in 1999. All of our friends thought we were nuts. Lol, we did really well with that move.
I lived in Roger’s Park in the late 1990’s for five years! It sucked then and it still sucks now!
“Sabrina, there are a lot of SFH under construction and for sale in the southport corridor, anywhere from $2 to $3+ million range. Not many in the <$2M range. Wondering if you can find any in that price range or it'd be nice to see what the cribchatters think about the construction/available homes in southport. For example: https://www.atproperties.com/9598242/1217-w-cornelia-avenue-chicago-illinois-60618-nei?ref=tinyatp&pt=68330598"
The finance industry is overrepresented in the purchase of $1,000,000+ homes in the city.
My wife and I moved to Rogers Park from Lincoln Park a couple of years ago. (Even bought a place that’s been featured on Crib Chatter before.) It was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
“It was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.”
to each his own.
Dude…Rogers park…really?
Why was it a great decision? Because you dig being close to Devon and loyola? Or just the generally crappy and worn out feeling of the entire neighborhood? Jesus. Rogers park sucks so hard.
“…the generally crappy and worn out feeling of the entire neighborhood.” Nailed it. How did you get in my head? Damn, dude, the internet is full of sad, sour, little men, and it’s my unfortunate duty to inform you are just another one of them. Welcome to Crib Chatter for me!
I suppose the move to Rogers Park could uncharitably be called “non-aspirational.” But I really like it a lot up here. I wasn’t happy in Lincoln Park. Developers were bigfooting everything. Entitled brats clogged the streets. The douche-bro index was climbing dangerously high–not as high as River North but definitely in the red zone. There was no sense of community. The things that drew us to the neighborhood were vanishing.
I’ve always been intrigued by Rogers Park. I’d go to performances at the Lifeline and walk along Glenwood Avenue and think, “This is cool. Why don’t people like Rogers Park?” I discovered over the years that there were people who like Rogers Park. People who like it for the same reasons that I do. Then there are people who like Rogers Park but are afraid to admit it in certain company because they’re afraid of, I don’t know, appearing down market or something. There are people who don’t like Rogers Park because other people don’t like Rogers Park or because they’ve cobbled together some impressions from the internet. And, of course, there are people, too many, who don’t like Rogers Park because of the residential mix (read: black, poor, Muslim, Hispanic). and, yes, there are people who don’t like Rogers Park because they don’t like Rogers Park. Whatever, cool.
There are beautiful old buildings in Rogers Park. Not just a meticulously curated few, waiting for the developer’s wrecking ball, but street after street of old buildings, where families still live and folks go about their day in the same way year after year. Some of the buildings are rundown, but most are well-maintained, with gardens and tidy grounds.
“Diversity” is such a charged word nowadays. Idealogues on both the left and the right wield it like a club. But the pot up here is *swirled*. By race, ethnicity, religion, and (these are important) age and economic status. There are oddballs, artists, old bohemians and commies, professionals, hermits. Not everyone is my people, but they’re all *my people*, you understand?
I work at home, in advertising, and my wife does Biglaw in the Loop (actually technically the West Loop now, since her firm just moved into the new building at River Point). She takes the el to work or the gym early in the morning; the Loyola stop is a six-minute walk. She always gets a seat, and she reads or answers email during her commute. I work for a while, then go to the gym (the same one I’ve had for seven years, in Lakeview, a ten-minute drive mid-morning). Lunch, work some more, then sometimes I’ll take a chair and go read on the beach, a 13-second walk from the front door of our building. There’s usually almost no one there on weekdays. I like it when the lake is kind of vexed and violent.
My wife takes Metra home, 18 minutes from Ogilvie. I meet her at the station. Sometimes we’ll stop for a drink at Rogers Park Social–I usually cook but she’s been doing this intermittent fasting thing lately, so our eating schedules only sync up on weekends.
We have a nice old place. Not luxury accommodations by the standards of our, urm, Commander in Chief (another sad, sour, little man) but largish and interesting. We’re slowly making some improvements. (SpacePak installed this month, before a vacation in Stockholm.)
I hope I have sufficiently answered your question. If you need more information, I’ll be in the booth in the back in the corner in the dark.
Not sad or sour here, just not a fan of rogers park.
I agree there are a lot of old buildings – but there are a lot of those in pretty much every Chicago neighborhood. I just don’t get the appeal of living in a neighborhood that looks so run down. Some call it “character” but a lot of rogers park just strikes me as dirty.
I’ll give you the beach. I kind of like that stretch of Sheridan around loyola.
as HD said, to each their own, just not for me.
madlybadly,
Nice attempt at romanticizing at Roger’s Park. If I were your creative writing teacher, I’d give it an A-.
However, on the flip side, a more realistic assessment would be:
1. Diversity – Roger’s Park is dumping ground for mostly third world immigrants who don’t share or even care to share your cultural values. Don’t believe me? How many friends do you or your wife have from any of these third world countries? Few I would guess.
2. Neighborhood feel – the neighborhood is so diverse and fragmented that few people interact with other other, in part because few can even speak english natively. Other than the rich entitled college students who drive up rent on the largest apartments in the area.
3. Beach – Pratt and Loyola beach are dumps. The sand is more like glass and beer bottle caps than quartz, and there’s an ever present ‘hood’ element that you better watch out for. And by ‘hood’ I mean groups of un/underemployed young men/women of all races who hangout at the beach lookin’ like they up to no good.
4. Crime – there is a lot of property crime in Roger’s Park. Always has been, always will be. Lots of burglaries, break ins, car thefts, assault, property crime and so forth. days that school gets out early are the worst, its just high school kids roaming around the streets committing crime. My buddy, who tolerates anti-social behavior more than most, lived in the RP for a few years as recently as two years ago and he was hearing gun shots on a regular basis.
5. Location – it’s SO far north. It’s a solid hour commute on the red line from the Loyola stop to an office building off jackson. I know, i did for many years. My commute from the suburbs on the Metra is an hour too – but it’s a nice ride, and fortunately, lacks the ‘half eaten chicken wings’ and ‘bag of peanut casings’ litering the floor. (as an aside probably many years ago I was on red line and some privileged looking wanna be gang banger high schooler was throwing his peanut casings on the floor of the train. I called the kid out for it on a full train , I was like ” what the heck are you doing? What is wrong with you? Did your mother not teach you how to be respectful?” The kid didn’t know what to do, and his friends started laughing at him. He got totally embarrased and got of the train. In today’s chicago I’d like be shot or stabbed and have my iphone stolen by his friends. But 8 years ago I could get away with that).
6.
6. Income – your household income is probably 3 to 4 times the average household income in the neighborhood. What is ‘great’ to you is a dump to most people. You’re just slumming it with the ‘poors’ living like a king among the peasant working class. It’s almost offensive to be honest. At least most the of the loyola students have incomes more in line with the neighborhood, because they’re students, many of whom are living off borrowed money, but your $200k+ household puts you in the top 1% in that neighborhood. It’s good to be king among the poors, you feel like you’re living like a ‘regular’ person, right?
When was the last time either of you have been up in RP? 10 years ago? Its a completely different neighborhood now, especially east of Ashland
Last winter was the last time I was in the RP for a visit to campus. It’s changed a lot but it’s still the RP.
My friend used to live in Rogers Park, near Howard and Western. Have you ever been to the Baskin Robbins at that location? I have never seen anything like it. We wanted milk shakes. The employees do not speak English. We left without shakes. We were not the only ones. Two of the people in line in front of me left without buying anything because the employees could not understand what they wanted. I don’t understand how they are still in business. It felt like being in Moscow, where they simply won’t serve you if they don’t want to deal with trying to understand what you want.
We used to go to Gullivers for pizza sometimes. My friend lived 4 blocks away and we had to drive because it was not safe to walk those 4 blocks.
I think other parts of Rogers Park are at least a little better, but I don’t know why people would choose to live in Rogers Park when other neighborhoods near it are nicer – Sauganash, Peterson Park, Lincoln Square, etc. Rogers Park isn’t exactly cheap. When my friend decided to buy, she ended up in Morton Grove because she was priced out of Rogers Park.
And prior to that my buddy lived up near pratt and a little west of greenview. So I was there a couple times a year to watch bears games at his place. The neighborhood hadn’t changed in 20 years.
I do like that one part of Rogers Park with all the mansions, near where St. Scholastica used to be.
Homedelete–So you’re saying that our household income is too high to live in Rogers Park? First of all, a strange and arbitrary standard. Second of all, you really have no idea about the variety of people who live in RP, do you?
Listen, my wife and I live modestly in an old six-flat near the beach. I drive an 11-year-old car. We spend money on travel, when she can take the time, and occasionally we’ll splash out on a painting or print, things that we like. We used to eat out all the time, but then we got healthier and I took up cooking (I’m not a “natural”). The weekends, though, are still sometimes a haze of taco joints and cocktail bars.
Since we plan on being here indefinitely, we’re making incremental improvements to our place. We had the floors refinished before we moved in. Paint, SpacePak, bookshelves next.
I mean, I’m not a monk. I have a weakness for Scottish knitwear and English shoes but generally have no desire to be a signifying monkey, semaphoring status to folks I don’t even know.
No doubt some romance crept into my description of Rogers Park, but that’s only because I really do like it so much. My happiness meter is at, say, 85%; in Lincoln Park it was at 40% and dropping. Your account of Rogers Park is one I barely recognize. I’ve lived here for two years and walk all over the neighborhood. I’ve never felt unsafe. Perhaps a case of god protecting fools? (Although I don’t go on Juneway Terrace after dark, because I’m not a fool at all times. But every dense urban area has streets like that.)
By gang members on the beach, do you mean the Pokemon Go players who swarmed the area last summer? Because they’re mostly gone, so you don’t have to be afraid anymore! I like to traipse out on the pier near our place at night to look at the lake and the lights and the moon. Couples walking on the beach, maybe an old rummy trying to fish or a young dude smoking weed. No bangers, though. But an increasing number of prams and strollers…hmmm.
Okay, my wife’s morning commute is a trade-off, I’ll admit. But she answers emails or reads or mentally organizes her workday. She’s, like, whipsmart–I’d be intimidated if I wasn’t sleeping with her. And in the evening the French Market entrance to Ogilvie is practically across the street from her building.
To sum up, senator, Rogers Park roolz, Lincoln Park droolz.
Jenny–unfortunately, neither Gulliver’s nor the corner of Western and Howard are actually in Rogers Park.
^^^ The commute is why RP will never fully gentrify…which sounds like what you love about it. I think you will get to love it for awhile. For me, with a loop job, it is just too much time on the red line compounded by limited access to major routes OUT of the city. It isn’t really a candidate for continued thorough gentrification.
Columbia beach is pretty great though – – like a getaway in the city. If I could get my hands on a place right on the beach up there, I would. RP also has decent access to bike routes out of the city which is a plus.
“Listen, my wife and I live modestly in an old six-flat near the beach. ”
I never lived more than 3 blocks from the beach in RP and for at least 3 of my 5 years the beach was at the end of my block. The cops up there called Sheridan Road the iron curtain because crime dropped significantly on the east side compared to the west side.
Some of my best memories from college were getting out of finals in May and playing fribee on the beach with friends. It’s the closest thing I could imagine to attending college in FL or Southern Cali, warm spring days, sunny, a six pack on the beach. But let’s not kid ourselves, Loyola Beach is not Daytona Beach, and Roger’s Park is the poor man’s Lincoln Park!
I’m sure RP works well for you, it worked for me at that time in my life too. But now I live in Long Grove, and it’s freaking amazing. I love it out here. So many of the chatterati here knock the wonderful living, large homes on large lots, no fences, lots of wild life, golf courses, close to shopping, entertainment, and it’s not cook county either, great schools, great people. It’s like the perfect place. I don’t want people to move here, I hope it stays one of Chicagoland’s best kept secrets
I always watch the fireworks on July 4th up on Loyola beach, can get a bit crazy with drunk people firing off their own but there is soooooo much more space there to do what you want, and you can watch both Evanston and Chicago’s fireworks at the same time which is pretty cool
“Jenny–unfortunately, neither Gulliver’s nor the corner of Western and Howard are actually in Rogers Park.”
What neighborhood is it then? I’ve always heard it called Rogers Park. The park called Rogers Park and the school called Rogers are within 4 blocks or so of Gullivers/Howard/Western.
Homedelete–Well, to be fair, RP and LP are really nothing alike, except that they both have large Catholic-affiliated colleges. (We lived on Arlington Place in LP and DePaul students would use our street as an alternate route to get from the bars on Lincoln to the bars on Clark.)
Man, I would not knock anybody for living where they want to live. That’s sort of my whole beautiful point. We all have REASONS. You could not pay me to live in River North. Yet, some people really want to live in River North. I don’t understand it–I mean, I “understand” it, but, you know–but I also try not to sh!t on them for it. They have REASONS.
Sonies–The 4th here is like the end of the world, and we’re all gonna die!
Jenny–I think technically that’s West Ridge, although some people do call it West Rogers Park.
“Sonies–The 4th here is like the end of the world, and we’re all gonna die!”
lol, its pretty wild and anxiety inducing for sure 🙂 but nothing a few beers can’t help with
http://cribchatter.com/?p=15415
Ok ok I know that this is slightly out of Rogers Park. But it sure fits the comment of living like kings with the local peasants. Maybe you two should buy this place?
I’ve always wondered what happened to this place after it sold. Did it get torn down? Turned into condos? Stay a SFH for someone who appreciated the area?
Anyone been down this street lattely? Next time I’m up north I’ll drive by.
Back on the market at 824K.