Scott08

I was wondering what the story on the house was just yesterday. It's very close to my home and I drive by it all the time. It's been there a long time....I remember it seemed to take several years to build, and it still looks pretty unoccupied to me. I've never seen anything but a handful of construction trucks parked at it. It's very fascinating in person, I would call it more of a mod than a faux Victorian. I always suspected the original designer/builder/owner ran out of money, I would love to hear more details.

I suspect you could extend a balcony 3 or feet out and support it from the existing structure.....that said I really think you would upset the balanced look of the front of your townhouse. The curved window facades of the 2nd and 3rd floors have a very cohesive look, I think a flat french door front with curved balcony would spoil the aesthetics.

My experience with IKEA stuff has been pretty good. I currently have two bedframes, one wood and one metal, a large bookshelf, computer desk, and bathroom vanity, all in addition to my kitchen stuff. The free-standing kitchen cabinets are heavy solid wood and stainless steel, no one would call them flimsy. As noted earlier, the assembly can have a lot to do with the piece's longevity. What I like about IKEA in general is its modern sense of style without the ridiculous pricetag that most modern furniture commands. I don't like all their stuff but believing it is all junk is just not my experience. IKEA is an extremely successful international company with a very green, community oriented philosophy. They would not be nearly so successul if all their stuff was crap.

I used the IKEA Varde series free-standing units for my kitchen. All of the walls were finished with sheetrock and/or beadboard, the entire floor done in dark stained bamboo. The cabinets are solid light colored birch with stainless steel accents, a couple of wall cabinets and a pots/pan rack finish the look. It's very unconventional but feedback from people viewing my house (it's currently for sale) is all positive. If someone just couldn't stand it, you could easily put up conventional cabinets since the rest of the room is already finished. In their store and catalog, I have also seen combinations of fixed mount and free standing cabinets.

Just at a glance, the house looks to be in much better condition than the one on the other side of the bayou on South MacGregor. If it's really been vacant for years though....never a good thing.

Too rich for my blood....and maybe too high for the area?

I wonder what would happen if you told them you actually wanted to keep the house? How much of the new house is built into that price?

My late mother grew up in the Heights, my parents met there and started the family there. I was born and raised in Spring Branch, then a far flung suburb, and my earliest forays into the Heights I thought the area was kind of rundown. Flash forward to the mid-80's. Suddenly, job and lifestyle changes have introduced me to a number of people living in the Heights and my perspective changed. I started renting there in 1987, I guess a late Firstwaver, or early 2ndwaver. In the mid-90's, a few years before she died, my mother took my sisters and me on a tour of her memories. All but one of the houses she had lived in were still there, her Reagan alma mater was still there, the grocery store on Studewood and 14th where her father died of a heart attack was still there. Pretty entrenched by then, I bought my house in 1998. For the last 12 years, I have commuted daily 29 miles to Spring for work, and have never once considered moving there. I've been thinking about this thread for several days, and while out walking my dog last night, I finally got my thoughts together. I think the Heights are fine, and safe from total extinction. Yes it is changing, and has been stated, has been changing since it was started. How else does an area go from suburb, to working class haven, to rundown, to trendy, without changing? The smaller cottage type homes still outnumber the McMansions, and will for many years to come. I have come to accept different housing, but am much more amenable to it if it's not a single castle sticking out like a sore thumb in a neighborhood. The townhouses in and around Rice Military are an example of one style of housing almost completely pushing out the "old" stock. I used to be apalled by that, but now understand why people want to live closer in and are willing to live denser to afford it. I'm kind of looking to move right now, but I will always savor the 20 years I've lived in the Heights, and I still think they'll be there to visit for the rest of my lifetime.

If that house was here, I'd be buying in a New York minute. In general, the Houston housing market is generally pretty cheap, but most of the desirable mods seem to be out of my range, i.e. $500K+. I checked out some of the realtors links in the back of Atomic Ranch magazine from around the country, and was surprised what cool houses for cool prices you could get.

The proposed/planned work is to add another jogging path and to make some pedestrian bridges over existing Memorial Drive. All of this was part of the almost decade old Master Plan I referred to earlier. The road around the jogging path/golf course on the north side of Memorial that started this thread is untouched.

It doesn't bother me when people razz the 60's ranch or modern. Its tract trash anyway.

Ouch! Me and lots of other folks on the Mod forum love 60's ranches and moderns. In many areas, they too are going the way of the dodo. I grew up in a MCM that my father designed himself. It's still standing but has been remuddled so much you can barely recognize its bones anymore. Tearing down ANY perfectly good home just to put up a bigger, uglier home saddens me.

Note that the house appears to have asbestos siding.

Other than aesthetics, what objections do you have to that? I've never heard of any potential dangers and there is concrete based replacements available. Must have been a popular "upgrade" in the '70's or so because there's lots of it in the area.

Post a disclaimer in order to protect people from the item put in place to protect people on the track? This is nanny state.

How about a disclaimer on the park? "If you are alive, you could die or be injured."

The park is fine the way it is.

Amen, sister.

Just doing a little soapbox routine here....almost a decade ago now, the Parks department hired an outside firm to draw up three different proposals for a Memorial Park Master Plan. It was rumored then that the Conservancy wanted the mountainbikers out so as an avid cyclist I got involved and attended all of the public meetings back then. "Our" trails on the south side of Memorial Drive in the wooded acreage mentioned previously were saved in all three scenarios, and the road/parking aspects were addressed at that time too. What is now happening in the park is a combination of ideas from all three of those proposals, one of its biggest victories was keeping the Houston Open out of the golf course there which would have required some radical changes that went against all versions of the Master Plan. One of the upsides of this civic involvement is that now the mountainbikers even have a seat on the Conservancy Board, something that would have been unheard of in the past. Although trail runners and hikers also use the trails back there, whenever there's a volunteer workday to repair them, it's almost always 100% cyclists helping out. Memorial Park is really an amazing treasure just the way it is. I believe it is the largest urban park in the US, caters to many divergent groups, i.e. cyclists, runners, golfers, tennis players, swimmers, etc. and actually has a very small amount of pavement as a percentage of its total area. I think Ima Hogg would be happy with the way the park has evolved with our times. I am personally against adding any more "structures" than necessary, the idea of protective barriers is ridiculous. As far as cars there, at least 75% of the time I use the park, I ride my bike there.

The first one is definitely the Fertitta house (I guess you can use the term loosely). The second one is also someone's house, there are no community centers in that part of River Oaks. There are still some pretty big chunks of land back in there. For instance the Menil house is on 3 1/2 acres, somewhere in River Oaks is still an estate with about 7 acres. I remember reading that in the days before the River Oaks Country Club Tennis Center was big enough, some of the matches were played at this residence.

Or how about this one:

http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cf...mp;backButton=Y

Beautiful house, but way, way, way above the price of anything around it.

I was thinking 20-30k in my head so that does not shock me. I'm in West U, though so I'd imagine that would add some costs in terms of permits/compliance and the likelihood of contractors figuring I can afford it so charging more.

You might first check to see if it's even allowed in your neighborhood. In mine, garage apartments built before a certain time frame are grandfathered in, but new ones are not allowed.

I hate to be the Negative Nellie, but to say this house needs lots of work is a gross understatement. This is the second 50's house I've been in this month that looks like it's been virtually abandoned for decades. Lots of sheetrock torn out for the mold remediation that was never finished per the realtor, missing flooring and subfloors, rotted wood inside walls, evidence of foundation problems in the back bedrooms...the list goes on. The back yard is absolutely huge but looks like a jungle and the outbuilding is falling apart too. This neighborhood was new to me and there's tons of MCM's, many of them looking fairly pristine. Although this house was surely a showpiece in its day, and could be again with enough money thrown at it, I just can't see why anyone would spend a fortune on this one when there are others all around that won't take near as much restoration. I'm starting to think maybe I'm not cut out to be a MCM owner...on the other hand my '49 house in Norhill was never allowed to get in such deplorable shape, most of the much older homes in my 'hood still look pretty good. It will be interesting to see if/when, and how much this one sells for. The neighborhood is not valuable enough to do a teardown so it will really have to be a MCM buff with vision and deep pockets.

I plan to drop by here today, any of the rest of you's going to be there?

My Heights area house (currently on market) was built in 1949, relatively recent considering. Although some later added wiring (notably the 220 for the central air/heat) is conventional, most of the house still has knob and tube and has given me absolutely no problems. I would not agree to replace it as a condition of sale. Replacing my water heater a few years back supercharged the water pressure, apparently the old one was pretty plugged up with rust.As stated by others, plumbing work is pretty easy if needed on a pier and beam house. Wood condition would be important to me though, inspecting the general condition as well as the general "solidity" of the house. Walking through my home feels very solid compared to others I've been in that creak with every step, and have obvious high and low spots.

http://search.har.com/engine/dispSearch.cf...mp;backButton=Y

I am selling my North Norhill cottage with the intention of moving to something modern or contemporary in the future. I have lived in the house since 1991, rented until I bought it from the landlord in 1998. Great location with access to I10, I610, and I45 all nearby. The house has been very trouble free for me...the only "maintenance" item I have replaced since living there is the hot water heater, central air and heat were added in 2001. In the last year, I have painted outside and in, new roof, and updated the bath and kitchen. I'll be glad to answer any questions, or talk to my realtor if you'd like to view.

I don't really understand the point of it because so many of the remodeled ones look totally out of place in the neighborhood anyway.

That's the whole rub of McMansions and their like. They NEVER look appropriate and yet there seems to be lots of misguided folks who think GIANT equals grand, never mind the pseudo-style.

I think traditional single-family-home residential zoning in most cities would prevent the types of townhome projects we see in unzoned Houston, where an old, small house without deed restrictions can be demolished and replaced with 3+ tall, thin townhomes.

Close to home, Austin and Dallas seem to have more mid and high rise multi-family projects in their inner cities than the townhouses in Houston. Less of them, but denser. I'm kind of torn about them. I hate to see perfectly good cottages in old neighborhoods mowed down to put up multiple townhouses, and yet I understand the need for more density, and the desire for homebuyers for more room and more modern amenities. In the last few months while I've been considering my moving options, I've toured some newer townhouses that were stunningly beautiful, I've also been in some that are the very definition of style over substance. Poor construction seems to be rampant in this segment too regardless of the asking price.

It seems to draw a certain type of clientele...

This line makes me laugh. A lot. Many of my friends in the Memorial Villages lament the closing of the Fiesta at Blalock and I-10, I never could stand those wealthy people in the store either. LOL.

The first house in your thread still looked very MCM for a '70's house. Many of the houses I have found on HAR also have atriums or courtyards at the entry which provide a great space for lots of glass without losing privacy.