Reply to Are these H St. NE / Capitol Hill houses priced appropriately?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Thoughts on this one?

4BR/3BA, 1814sf, $990,000:
https://www.redfin.com/DC/Washington/403-6th-St-NE-20002/home/9899007

The location is great, but it's kind of an odd mix of original features and ill-chosen updates.  I don't think I've seen a rowhouse that has both original unpainted woodwork still intact but also has that stupid oval door.  It looks like they replaced the hardwood floors at some point, the kitchen and baths look dated (and not in a vintage way), and there's [i]so much[/i] carpet.

I can't decide if the interior will be too off-putting or if someone will see its problems as easily fixable.[/quote]

Stuff like this makes me really sad. When we were first looking to buy in the neighborhood, this house was exactly what we wanted -- needs work, great bones, great location. You could easily live in this house as is, but then we'd obviously want to do a renovation, but maybe over time to spread the cost out. We were looking in 2011 and our budget was 500k and something like this was out of reach -- it would have sold for closer to 600 back then, maybe more depending on square footage.

Anyway, it's 10 years later and we could afford 600 now but not $1million. Even if we sold our condo, which is what we wound up buying after losing out on like 14 row homes, it hasn't appreciated enough to buy a house that costs twice what we paid for the condo a decade ago. We have more savings and higher incomes but also a kid, so our willingness to renovate over time is a bit lower and our budget has to cover more things.

Anyway, this house is just a perfect example of what has happened in the neighborhood over the last decade and the reason there's no way we'll be able to stay long term unless we can figure out how to stay in our condo as our kid gets older. Not saying this is a tragedy, I'm sure no one feels sorry for us and I don't expect them to. But to see prices nearly double in the last decade and realize that we simply do not have the resources to stick around in a neighborhood we've made our home for going on 15 years is disheartening. I wish we'd been able to get one of the row homes we bid on, and maybe we'd be in a better spot, but we had a limited down payment and no escalation clause, and real estate was plenty competitive back then, too.

Oh well. I'm sure someone will be happy there. Not us.[/quote]

Yes. We bought about 15 years ago. We're well-paid Feds who had some equity from a condo, so were able to buy a nice but slightly dated house a 10-minute walk from the Capitol for around $600,000. Not only have prices skyrocketed for the same types of houses, but many have had high-end renovations that further push up the prices. It had already been a neighborhood for the upper-middle class, but now it's getting out of reach for everyone but the upper-upper middle class - big-firm lawyers, doctors, etc. [/quote]

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