Several readers have reached out to us over the last year or more, wondering about the property at 817 S. 9th St. and concerned it might collapse. That's the sort of thing that happens when a building has a couple of wooden support beams attached to its facade for many months, as was the case until earlier this year. We can't find a good photo of the building when it was in that state, but here's a photo from 2014 that shows the two story building that had been standing at the property.
You can see in the image, the home was listed for sale at one point, with the owners asking for $310K. But nobody was interested, perhaps because the building had serious structural problems and a raft of violations. Developers purchased the property for $150K at sheriff's sale in the summer of 2014, and it's taken a little longer than we'd have expected for them to get moving on a new project here. That being said, they've torn down the old home and there's now a new home under construction at this address which looks like it broke ground a few months ago.
The new home has some unusual elements, including that it's immediately next door to the Rite Aid parking lot. The developers have opted for a third floor setback on the front of the home, even though that's not necessary with a three-story building next door. Since the setback isn't required by the code, it seems they'll be using the front of the third story as an outdoor space, so that'll be a cool feature for whoever ends up living here. In addition, you can see that the home has a breezeway along its side, something we don't see all that often with new construction. While this makes the place narrower on part of the interior, it allows the builders to place windows on the side of the home, dramatically increasing the natural light inside.
We expected that the home would already be listed for sale, but it appears it isn't yet on the market. Given the paucity of new construction in this area, we can see this home selling for a pretty penny, surely beyond $800K. And while buyers might prefer something with parking, maybe the future owner of this home will be able to work something out with the store next door. Has anybody had success negotiating something like that with a neighbor that has a large and underused surface parking lot?