I thought it would be nice if we started featuring houses once a week. After all, some of us are looking to buy, and it’s interesting to see what’s for sale in the hood.
454 Irving is a beautiful blonde brick, bow-front two-family in one of Bushwick’s best islands of intact housing. This stretch of Irving from Putnam to Weirfield is tree-lined, lightly-trafficked, and full of families. The streets that radiate from Irving in either direction are full of charming and well-kept homes, many with postage-stamp front lawns and original ironwork. While we don’t have any photos of the inside of this house, the outside looks great and the inside is 3300sqft with two apartments: a 2/1 and a 3/1. The back yard is a decent 20×40 — plenty of room for a great garden.
454 Irving Avenue | $625,000
3300sqft | 20ft-wide | 2-family, 5br/2ba | brick
Myrtle-Wyckoff LM
Jimmy Legs June 18th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
damn that’s like 1100 sf per floor, $189 per square foot! i love the ridgewoody feel of this part of the neighborhood. actually it probably was part of ridgewood before they got all uppity.
ricmac01 June 18th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
These old houses look great but the asking price is too high for 2008. Here’s a link to the Craigslist ad for this place and it does include some nice interior photos.
http://newyork.craigslist.org/brk/rfs/721740745.html
Jimmy Legs June 18th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
i can’t decide if that’s too high. the economy for real estate is not so hot, but that’s a pretty good per sf cost. but it may just be a matter of time, when people discover that little corner of the neighborhood this may seem in retrospect like a darned good deal.
still, those interior photos show gross carpet and annoying paint color choices. but still…
Jeremy Sapienza June 18th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
This is quite cheap for an entire house in great shape — I think that even more now that I’ve seen the interiors. I mean, I’d still rip that kitchen out but the details seem totally intact. I saw ugly, small houses on horrible blocks that were completely destroyed inside for more than this in 2006 — considering this is the opposite of all that, it’s a deal. I don’t know by what standard the price is too high for 2008 — certainly not by the standard of the rest of Brooklyn and New York. These houses were in the 700s when we were looking.
ricmac01 June 18th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Yes, by 2006/07 standards this is a fair price and I agree, the photos of this house really look nice. But with the recent glut of empty/abandoned houses in this area, I think an owner will have to wait for the right buyer before this will sell at the asking price. The banks are no longer willing to throw 90% loans at anyone who asks, couple that with prospective buyers’ job concerns due to the unstable/inflationary economy (shh, Mr.Bush it IS called a recession) and I bet this house sits for a while longer unless they cut the price. But maybe, as long as there’s such a desire to throw money at any opportunity to be anywhere close to Manhattan people will continue to over-pay out of fear that it’s their last chance. And yes, I do think that with time this corner of the neighborhood will also become desirable and therefore, in retrospect look like a darned good deal.
Jeremy Sapienza June 18th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Oh I agree overall, and I do think an offer of 575 would probably fly here, if the owner is reasonable. I’d love to trade my ugly dump house on a loud street for this. *sigh*
ricmac01 June 18th, 2008 at 8:29 pm
“The grass is always greener…”. But you guys have put in quite a bit of work into your house in a relatively short period of time and are working at creating a priceless HOME! (kiss hug)
Mopar June 18th, 2008 at 11:26 pm
When I saw this house in February it had no plumbing, no heat, and no electricity. No thanks.
Tony June 19th, 2008 at 12:24 am
What a coincidence! When I was 21 I rented a small two room apartment at 448 Irving (I think it might be a few houses to the right of that photo). It was a great little flat on the top floor. I think the landlord (Dominican guy) split the top floor into two living spaces, I rented the front half. I loved living on that block. It was only a few minutes to the Myrtle avenue station and I was close to some good shopping areas. I think I paid $260/month back in 1985/88. I have a photo of me walking out of my front door taken back around 1987. Wish I had a scanner. I wonder what my old place is renting for now?
Jimmy Legs June 19th, 2008 at 11:53 am
Mopar, when you say ‘no plumbing, no heat, no electricity’ do you mean it was all in need of repair? or was it just turned off? or was the house literally stripped of wire, pipes, and radiators?