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April 27, 2009

House of the Day: 436 Classon Avenue Revisited

436-Classon-Avenue-0409.jpg
436 Classon Avenue is a perfect lesson in why over-pricing a house is a waste of time and, in a declining market, can result in a lower selling price than if the owner had just started with a reasonable price tag up front. Here's what we wrote when this was a House of the Day in March 2008:

This three-family Greek Revival at 436 Classon Avenue has a wonderful parlor floor and a front porch to boot, but we've got no idea what the owners are thinking asking $2,165,000 million on this street. We can't think of a house within three blocks of this place that has fetched even $1,500,000. Keep on dreamin'.

So now the question is whether the current asking price of $1,495,000 is low enough to get a deal done. It might have been possible a year ago but seems doubtful today.
436 Classon Avenue [Brooklyn Properties] GMAP P*Shark
House of the Day: 436 Classon Avenue [Brownstoner]






Posted by Brownstoner at 1:18 PM | Comments (16)
Categories: Clinton Hill, HOTD

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Comments

Great call to revisit this house as an example of market over-reaching. You are absolutely right that if the current ask had been floated a year ago they would have likely had a buyer. Now they will be lucky to get a mil I would think.

Posted by: wasder at April 27, 2009 1:21 PM

they would be lucky to get one million.
Will probably have to rent it until the market recovers from its present vegetative state.

Posted by: mcKenzie at April 27, 2009 1:27 PM

I like the building (toured it two months back), but the design decisions are rather eccentric. The kitchen is in the basement, while the parlor and masterbedroom are on the parlor floor and a second bderoom in the back of the second floor. The rest of the house is rentals. Seems like ti would have to be reconfigured to make an attractive home. Wouldn't really work for a family now.

Posted by: Putnamdenizen at April 27, 2009 2:03 PM

There are so many properties that are making this exact same mistake right now. Tear off the freakin' band-aid, people. Let's get this done. Chop the price and the unit moves. I am a ready, willing and able buyer, but I know prices are coming down. Meet me where prices are going and you get my money.

Posted by: lechacal at April 27, 2009 2:09 PM

It's greedy pigs like this who deserve to lose out. Maybe somebody can pick it up at a foreclosure auction before long.

Posted by: williamsburgguy at April 27, 2009 2:15 PM

The layout seems like a nightmare and the house itself is rather unremarkable. I bid 900K but I would have gone as low as $850K. The current owners must be delusional if they think they'll get that price.

Posted by: gracias at April 27, 2009 2:27 PM

Thank you, Putnamdenizen. I could not figure out the layout.

Posted by: Nomi at April 27, 2009 2:30 PM

"over-pricing a house is a waste of time and, in a declining market, can result in a lower selling price than if the owner had just started with a reasonable price tag up front"

...and just accepted the highest bank-approved bid regardless of the 'reasonable' asking price.

***Bid half off peak comps***

Posted by: Brownstones Half Off at April 27, 2009 2:52 PM

location is so so. always thought that area would develop a little faster / better. Below a million will get it some action. Priced at 950 or so, house is not bad relative to other comparable ppties priced higher. @ 1.5M, keep on dreaming

Posted by: more4less at April 27, 2009 3:14 PM

Okay people. Are you really saying that this house is only worth slightly double the price of a one bedroom apartment? Look at the apt. of the day.

Posted by: dt at April 27, 2009 3:29 PM

if this was similar location as that apt, this would be 1.4M so ~3.5x

Posted by: more4less at April 27, 2009 3:32 PM

That block is pretty sketchy in my book.

Posted by: mcKenzie at April 27, 2009 3:34 PM

dt - look at the LOCATION of the apt of the day. It's dramatically superior to the location of this house.

That said, the apartment of the day isn't worth $550k either. :P

Posted by: cwbuecheler at April 27, 2009 3:34 PM

My Mom would always go on and on about how my one-bedroom apartment cost more than their big rambling colonial in Pennsylvania. But that's the way it is.
A nice elegant apartment in a genteel building on a safe block can certainly be worth 50% of a big inelegantly chopped up house on an iffy block with more than its share of urban grit (read squalor). Yup!

Posted by: mcKenzie at April 27, 2009 3:40 PM


When the bogus bank bailout Ponzi scheme orchestrated first by Bush and now by Obama starts to crumble, $500,000 for this house will seem like wishful thinking.

As Chicken Little said, "The sky is falling. It's falling, the sky."

Posted by: IronBalls at April 27, 2009 10:46 PM

I used to live, and still own a house, on Classon Ave and, while it's not the prettiest street in the area, the majority of it is far from sketchy. It's basically a solid family area -- like much of it around the border of Bed-Stuy and Clinton Hill that gets dismissed as scary because it doesn't look like Park Slope.

I bid on this house in 2004, and lost the sale to the woman who ultimately purchased and renovated it. We don't know each other well, but I did meet her subsequently and got a tour of the house post renovation and have to say she's experienced, knowledgeable and did a fantastic job. Compared to what it was, that house is a palace now. Some of the layout decisions are unusual but none of them are bad. The basement kitchen is incredibly cozy with radiant heat, etc. There were servants quarters with a second interior stair in the back, which is, I believe, what guided this layout decision. Besides, it works for her, the homeowner, and could conceivably work for some one else. It would, for example, for me. I love what she did with it.

2.1 million seemed high to me when I saw it listed last year, but I also have an idea of how much money she must have poured into the house to make it a high quality reno. The current price is definitely more in keeping with the market right now and I think she'll find a buyer soon enough because it's such a beautiful and unusual old house with much of the original detail intact and well preserved.

Posted by: herkimermaid at April 28, 2009 10:27 AM

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