The 2000 block of Gerritt Street is undergoing a serious transformation, the likes of which we’ve seen before on other blocks in this very neighborhood. Turning back the clock just a couple of years, this block was split roughly 50/50 between two-story homes and vacant lots. When a block is in such a condition, it adds additional risk to the already challenging development process. After all, when you build a single new home on a block with two dozen vacant lots, the buyers don’t typically line up around the block.

Such was the case when we visited the block a little more than two years ago, as V2 Properties had just built a single new home on this challenging block. Perhaps the V2 people knew, when they planned that home, that another developer was working on a 9 home development on the block, and figured they could sell their home on the promise of future development on the block. The home sold after a little more than a month on the market, so clearly they made some kind of compelling argument.

When we came back to the block last spring, we saw that some more new homes had risen on the block since our last visit. While the home we mentioned above sold for $350K in 2015, the newer homes sold at prices between $400K and $450K, thanks to a combination of the improving block and the general momentum of sale prices in Point Breeze. Also at that time, we realized that foundations were in place for that 9-home project we had discussed previously. We visited the block the other day, and saw that all of those homes have now been framed out. Could these homes sell for $500K? We’d say they could.

In total, we counted 12 homes on this block that are currently under construction and another 9 that looked like they had been built in the last two years. That represents exactly half of the properties on the block, and doesn’t count any of the homes that might have been rehabbed over the last few years. We’ve seen this show before, on the 2000 block of Annin and the 1300 block of S. Chadwick. And it’s probably pretty safe to assume that we’ll see it again in the future on other blocks in this neighborhood.