We were making out way into South Kensington the other day, and happened to spy a ‘For Sale’ sign on a building at the awkward intersection of Germantown Avenue and Thompson Street. Back in 2012, we wrote about a couple of properties at this intersection, noting that the vacant building at 1301-03 Germantown Ave. represented an interesting development opportunity, as did the vacant lot on the southeast corner. Things have changed considerably since then at the southeast corner, as the first Liberty Square building has been under construction there for awhile now.

While Liberty Square represents a dramatic change, the opposite corner looks almost exactly the way it did five years ago. The bones of the building still look pretty solid, though the windows are all boarded up and some old metal security gates give the building a rather unwelcoming vibe. The building is listed for sale for $750K, and has been on the market since the end of last year. We feel as we did previously, that it could be a great development opportunity for the right developer, but the fact that it’s been on the market for so long is evidence that we’re correct in our belief that it’s priced way too high.

One issue here is that the property is zoned ICMX, which means that any residential conversion would require a variance from the ZBA. We suspect that such a project would find support from the community, as an apartment building would be a great fit for this space, but there’s still risk that neighbors will push back over any sort of density because of parking concerns. With the combination of the zoning risk and the high price, we think this building will continue to sit on the market for the foreseeable future. Of course, that shouldn’t stop anyone out there from putting in an offer at a more reasonable price. The usual caveat applies though- just because you make the offer doesn’t mean the seller will accept it.