Residential Real Estate in your city

[JManc]

Originally Posted by The North One

Not sure what you think is satirical about it. That home also just got a 25K price cut so clearly they're having trouble selling.

I suspect it has much more to do with a 7% interest rate on a $700k mortgage in STL than the stairs...

[Steely Dan]

Also, the stairs in that STL house don't look any different to me than the stairs in any older house. Somehow, billions of humans have been navigating those for untold centuries.

And the lot is 25' wide according to Google maps, pretty standard for a residential lot in an urban city. Hell, that's even a bit generous compared to the older parts of east coast cities.

And I don't think having living space across three floors is fundamentally incompatible with "modern living", as boatloads of contemporary suburban houses in the US have their living space spread between a first floor, a second floor, and a finished basement.

It's an all around lovely city house.

The only reason it's even remotely within the realm of "affordable" is its location in a mid-tier flyover city. Pick it up and air drop that sucker into one of the coastal big boys, and it's instantly millions of dollars all day long.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by JManc

Yes and no. It's "affordable" because it's in Marshall, has only one bedroom and probably needs a lot of updating.

That’s kind of the point.

For an actual example, not that long ago, a SSPer from Ottawa pointed out a friend of his bought a house in Ompah, Ontario (look it up on a map!) for like $300k and was glad he could find that deal…

In a real housing crisis, you’d have longtime Dallasites settling on buying a modest house in Marshall for $500k and they’d actually rejoice they could buy something. THAT is what a housing crisis looks like.

As Steely says, there’s a huge difference between “a regular Joe Six Pack can’t afford a detached SFH on the Upper East Side” and an actual housing crisis.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

The only reason it's even remotely within the realm of "affordable" is its location in a mid-tier flyover city. Pick it up and air drop that sucker into one of the coastal big boys, and it's instantly millions of dollars all day long.

That's a $3 - $5 million house in Brooklyn. In fact, here's a house that is a pretty similar style that Zillow estimates around $3m which is on the cheaper end for this neighborhood: https://maps.app.goo.gl/hF8rB1y5ZL6q23bj8

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

That's a $3 - $5 million house in Brooklyn. In fact, here's a house that is a pretty similar style that Zillow estimates around $3m which is on the cheaper end for this neighborhood: https://maps.app.goo.gl/hF8rB1y5ZL6q23bj8

If it were plopped down in northside Chicago, it'd probably command somewhere between $2M - $2.5M, perhaps even a bit more in the heart of super-prime Lincoln Park near the lake.

The house itself is by no means undesirable, it's just not located in the type of area where top-dollar home buyers want to be.

Real estate is a very local thing.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Also, the stairs in that STL house don't look any different to me than the stairs in any older house. Somehow, billions of humans have been navigating those for untold centuries.

The stairs on really old narrow 1800's homes like this are definitely not like a typical pre-war home, which will usually have multiple landings. I mean just look at the pictures on zillow. The third floor staircase is basically a glorified ladder. A huge chunk of buyers especially over 60 will not even consider living in something like this. There's a reason ranches are always more expensive. There's a well known history of the stairs on these homes being extremely dangerous for servants of the time. So it's not like I'm making this all up lol. Not really an issue for a younger person, but climbing those every day would be annoying.

Floor plan is also a mess, tons of wasted hallway space. A random sitting room in the middle of the first floor? Lots of useless partitions. It just doesn't work with how people live today.

The only reason it's even remotely within the realm of "affordable" is its location in a mid-tier flyover city. Pick it up and air drop that sucker into one of the coastal big boys, and it's instantly millions of dollars all day long.

You could say this about any housing typology so doesn't necessarily mean town-homes like this are particularly desirable.

[Steely Dan]

^ the stair up to the 3rd floor is clearly the old attic stair. 99 times out of 100 those are always janky as 🞵🞵🞵🞵 in old 19th century homes.

The main stair is quite normal.

Yeah, this isn't the proper home for a couple of geezerly boomer-fucks to age in place within. Oh well.

But it's a really 🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵 sweet city house.

In the right neighborhood in a higher tier city, it would command mint.

St. Louis isn't quite there yet, which is ok, cuz DEALS!!!!!!!!!!

[The North One]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

The main stair is quite normal.

Except it's not, it's a steep and very high set of stairs that's a straight shot down with no landing what-so-ever.

Pretty much entirely exclusive to very old east coast style town homes and row homes like this.

[Steely Dan]

^ right, it's extremely normal for homes of that time period.

Not a big deal at all for a regular person.


FWIW, every new construction flat building that I work on in Chicago has similar stairs. It's just how stairs get built when every single square foot counts.

We even still regularly utilize winders in our tightest buildings.

🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵 winders!?!?!? In 2025? Who knew?

[Wigs]

Able bodied and healthy people usually don't think about these kind of things.

The North One, are you elderly or mobility impaired or something?
Otherwise you sound like a huge pearl clutcher. Many folks wish they could live in a cool old house like the St. Louis ones

[JManc]

Originally Posted by lio45

That’s kind of the point.

For an actual example, not that long ago, a SSPer from Ottawa pointed out a friend of his bought a house in Ompah, Ontario (look it up on a map!) for like $300k and was glad he could find that deal…

In a real housing crisis, you’d have longtime Dallasites settling on buying a modest house in Marshall for $500k and they’d actually rejoice they could buy something. THAT is what a housing crisis looks like.

As Steely says, there’s a huge difference between “a regular Joe Six Pack can’t afford a detached SFH on the Upper East Side” and an actual housing crisis.

Marshall is no where near Dallas so that only works if you're a) well off b) retired c)WFH or d) are a super commuter. Yes, there is affordable housing but often not near economic or career opportunities so it's kind of a moot point in most cases. Ompah is 70 miles away from Ottawa so that's a hard pass for most people otherwise priced out of Ottawa.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by JManc

Yes, there is affordable housing but often not near economic or career opportunities so it's kind of a moot point in most cases.

The rust belt bucks that trend, largely due to the extremely high levels of racial segregation found in the region's major cities.

Here in Chicago we have thousands of extremely affordable housing unit on the market right now, all within a relative stones throw of the largest central business district in the interior of the nation.

The reason? A giant percentage of our nation's populace will not live in neighborhoods that are 90%+ black, at any price point.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by The North One

The stairs on really old narrow 1800's homes like this

This St. Louis house isn't narrow. It's like 25 feet wide. A narrow house is less than 15 feet wide.

For example, the staircases in this old row house complex in Cincinnati were maybe 13 feet wide and the staircases were maybe 20" wide...the narrow-everything was a big reason why developers did not save it:
https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/conte...age-asset.jpeg?content-type=image%2Fjpeg

A random sitting room in the middle of the first floor? Lots of useless partitions. It just doesn't work with how people live today.

You just seem jealous that the proles in "flyover country" are living like kings while people on the coasts blow their trust funds on 🞵🞵🞵🞵.

Here's a similar fully renovated NOT narrow 1800s row how house in Cincinnati selling for way under $1 million:
https://www.sibcycline.com/listing/2654022/2018-Freeman-Avenue-Cincinnati-OH-45214

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

The reason? A giant percentage of our nation's populace will not live in neighborhoods that are 90%+ black, at any price point.

IMO this is a huge factor in assessing relative affordability. Even the cheap(er) metros are deceptively less-than-affordable when you look at locational preferences. And it isn't surprising that the healthier metros with few blacks are typically among the least affordable.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

You just seem jealous that the proles in "flyover country" are living like kings while people on the coasts blow their trust funds on 🞵🞵🞵🞵.

Here's a similar fully renovated NOT narrow 1800s row how house in Cincinnati selling for way under $1 million:
https://www.sibcycline.com/listing/2654022/2018-Freeman-Avenue-Cincinnati-OH-45214

Clearly you're getting far more house for you money in a Cincy than, say, a Seattle. But IMO it's a bit deceptive.

I recently stayed in Cincy, in the Mount Adams neighborhood. This is an all-white, non-trendy, in-town neighborhood, with few amenities. Not a single decent restaurant, but great location and views. Homes in move-in condition are well above $1 million. The all-white, upscale neighborhoods east of Mount Adams are all generally pretty pricey, all the way out to the sprawl mansion area around Indian Hill.

There are plenty of cheap in-town neighborhoods, but they tend to be black or Appalachian, broken-down, with 🞵🞵🞵🞵 schools and safety issues, and without the govt. supports you'd get in a Seattle.

There are interesting cheapish areas in Newport/Covington (took a whole day walking around), with kind of a weird mix of gentrifiers, blacks and Appalachians, but I saw nothing really "wow" except for that Mansion Hill area in Newport. Most of it just looked like any old housing along the Ohio River.

And obviously most people in Cincy area just live in prefab suburban housing, like most Americans. If you want this housing, yes, Cincy will allow one to have massive housing buying power relative to a Seattle.

But there are other factors. I'm secular, bordering on irreligious, and would have a hard time living somewhere where religion is very in-your-face, from a Creation Museum/Noah's Ark, to some of the biggest suburban megachurches I've ever seen. There's even some giant Jesus statue on I-75. We're also a trilingual family, foreign-born and my wife looks very "ethnic" and I don't think I heard someone speaking anything other than English in five days, and the only accents I heard were some Indian parents at the Union Station museums.

[KamJacob]

Originally Posted by Crawford

There's even some giant Jesus statue on I-75.

Touchdown Jesus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CHcR7_c630

[DCReid]

Originally Posted by Crawford

IMO this is a huge factor in assessing relative affordability. Even the cheap(er) metros are deceptively less-than-affordable when you look at locational preferences. And it isn't surprising that the healthier metros with few blacks are typically among the least affordable.

Plenty of metros with a lot of blacks that are not very affordable including the one you live in, NYC, and DC. The Midwest and many newer southwest metros are generally affordable for different reasons. Midwest is because of slow population growth and 'relatively' weaker economies, the south because of exurban sprawl.

Plenty of metros that had few blacks are affordable or were such as Boise, Idaho, which is whiter and was much cheaper than places like Denver or Seattle.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by DCReid

Plenty of metros with a lot of blacks that are not very affordable including the one you live in, NYC, and DC.

NYC and DC are pretty affordable, with not particularly high income-to-housing cost ratios. Both have high incomes and tons of relatively affordable areas. If you compare to intl. equivalents, they're almost laughably affordable. Compare incomes and housing typologies in London and Berlin to NYC and DC.

The most unaffordable U.S. areas are generally on the West Coast and in South Florida.

But my point was more nuanced. Housing preferences are frequently tailored to avoid black areas, thus exaggerating the relative affordability of metros with large black populations. Metro Detroit is relatively cheap, but most homeowners will automatically eliminate the most affordable third of the metro, so basically all the areas with comically cheap homes.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Clearly you're getting far more house for you money in a Cincy than, say, a Seattle. But IMO it's a bit deceptive.

It's not that deceptive

You just happen to have particularly high class tastes/preferences/desires.

Two of my cousins were born and raised in College Hill, and they're both now raising their families in Cincy neighborhoods, Northside and North Avondale, respectively. Both of them live in large 100+ year old SFH's that were absolutely stupid cheap from my Chicago perspective , and they both love where they live.

But they're regular old middle class people ("good enough is good enough."), not upper middle class striver types ("I demand only the best!!")

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

It's not that deceptive

IMO it is deceptive, bc relative affordability is more than just plugging in home price and household income.

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

You just happen to have particularly high class tastes/preferences/desires.

Ridiculous. No one in my (relatively poor and extremely unsophisticated) birth town in Germany would ask my family what church we attend. That would be a common question in much of America, Cincy included. I wouldn't raise my kid in such an environment.

I don't care about Michelin-starred restaurants and all that 🞵🞵🞵🞵. I do care about raising my kid in an environment free from religious weirdness and extreme ignorance. Just saying "Cincy sprawl tract home is 300k while Seattle sprawl tract home is 800k; therefore Cincy is stupid cheap" isn't a complete picture of relative affordability. Humans aren't widgets.