Real estate news & trends
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Edgewater
A recent Atlantic Cities post sketched the real estate issues that accompany school closings: One of the thorniest issues (in what is a veritable forest of mess) is what to do with those school buildings once they’re empty. Often, the facilities are in poor shape, with promised renovations put off quasi-indefinitely. Many are located in ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on April 10, 2013
Several neighborhoods that had seen a steep decline in median selling prices in recent quarters saw an equally steep rise last quarter. The effect was present mostly in single-family homes. Three examples are Near South Side, Edgewater and Rogers Park. The median selling prices of Near South Side houses had fallen 44% between Q3 2011 ...
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Posted by Jeff Baird on November 9, 2012
The three blue and gold 11-story towers of Edgewater‘s Catalpa Gardens make a colorful statement up close and from a distance. The 126-unit complex’s other distinctive features include glass walkways connecting the towers, a rooftop deck with outstanding views – and unit values that have radically imploded. When we looked in on the building two ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on November 7, 2012
Five years ago we reported that 24 one-bedroom “lofty” condos were for sale at 5427 N Broadway in a development called Broadway Village Lofts. The building had been the site of an industrial laundry / dry cleaning plant. We followed up in May of 2008, reporting that 10 of the 24 units were still available, ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on September 11, 2012
When Chicago housing prices start trending down, some communities sink further, faster than others. Over the past 4 decades Edgewater east of the El tracks had typically ranked among the fast sinkers, its down-market density portending price-descending destiny. When we took a lengthy look at Edgewater seven years ago, residential development was booming, business was ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on June 21, 2012
Nicholas Apostal of Coldwell Banker’s The Apostal Group takes us on a tour of a 2-bedroom, 2-bath condo at 1518 W Olive St that’s filled with sunlight. This vintage rehab of a top-floor corner unit has 11-foot ceilings in the living room, a covered front terrace and rear deck, a private garage, a designer master ...
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Posted by sponsored post on June 12, 2012
The so-called Winthrop Kenmore corridor has long been a troubled area, home to a largely transient population. According to Compass Rose: In the 1960s and 70s, when the neighborhood was at its low point, the Winthrop-Kenmore corridor was called Arson Alley because 25% of the buildings were empty and vacant. Today, due to a massive ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on January 30, 2012
Last week we quietly began keeping track of the available inventory of homes and condos listed for rent in six north lakefront ZIP Codes in the local MLS. The ZIP Codes hug the lakefront from Lincoln Park north to Rogers Park. We’ve been watching MLS-listed rentals in downtown ZIP Codes for more than 2 years, ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on January 16, 2012
The real estate crash that began late in 1979 hit Edgewater the hardest among Chicago’s north lakefront neighborhoods. Edgewater condos sold for an average of $76,000 during 1979 and for only $56,750 during the first six months of 1992. Adjusted for inflation the average Edgewater condo lost 60% of its value over that period. This ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on January 11, 2012
When we first focused on Substation North Lofts, in October of 2006, Yo’s Alison Soltau marveled at the notion of a loft priced at nearly $500,000. The unit sold at $475,000, and a year later we were reporting that only one unit remained available in the 16-unit conversion of a ComEd facility at 1128 W ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on January 9, 2012
The three months ending September 30 were a boon to single family home sales in several key north side neighborhoods, including Edgewater (up 91% over last quarter / 102% over a year ago), Lincoln Square (up 84% / 93%); North Center (up 119% / 28%), Lakeview (up 68% / 38%), and Uptown (up 79% / ...
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Posted by Jeff Baird on October 28, 2011
Today’s e-mail from 48th Ward Ald. Harry Osterman led me indirectly to the 48th Ward Community Process for Zoning and Land Use Approvals (PDF). The process, which is “intended to benefit the community and the incoming business by streamlining the decision making process …” requires, among other things, that an applicant for a zoning or ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on September 16, 2011
When Joe Askins homed in on Edgewater’s Catalpa Gardens last summer he wondered whether it was “short sale central.” The project has had an uneven pricing history, quite a few short sales, and decidedly mixed reviews at Yelp. This week at YoChicago we’re focusing mostly on the city’s view properties, and Catalpa Gardens qualifies on ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on August 17, 2011
Bryn Mawr isn’t the last stop for northbound riders on the Red Line, but it will be the last stop for me in this Riding the Red Line video series. The ‘L’ station is located in Edgewater’s Bryn Mawr Historic District and is used by more than 1.5 million passengers per year. Watch all 20 ...
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Posted by Joseph Askins on May 13, 2011
Today’s Red Line segment looks at the Berwyn ‘L’ station, located on the southern edge of Edgewater. It’s a busier station than Argyle, has a very strong WalkScore thanks to a number of stores located along Broadway, and is just two short blocks away from Lincoln Park.
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Posted by Joseph Askins on May 12, 2011
2010 was not kind to condominiums on Chicago’s Far North Side: Our two northernmost neighborhoods, Rogers Park and Edgewater, both saw condo prices decline steeply. For Rogers Park, it was a steep decline for three quarters — it’s 36% lower than last quarter and 52% lower than the same quarter a year prior. The last ...
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Posted by Jeff Baird on February 23, 2011
We last looked at 6030 North Sheridan in June 2006, when Rick Levin & Associates was preparing a developer closeout auction at the 292-unit building, with one-bedroom condos starting at a suggested opening bid of $125,000. These days, the median price of a one-bedroom in the Edgewater high-rise is less than half that amount: $59,950. ...
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Posted by Joseph Askins on February 18, 2011
Sixteen of the 26 condo closings recorded in Edgewater since the turn of the new year have been below $100,000. These five-figure homes have ranged from a one-bedroom / one-bath at 5815 N Sheridan Rd, which closed for $35,000, to an 1,100 square-foot two-bedroom / one-bath at 5739 N Ridge Ave, which closed for $99,000. ...
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Posted by Joseph Askins on February 14, 2011
There are lots of sites where you can check whether there are any registered sex offenders in your neighborhood. The State Sex Offender Registry has the advantage of making it easy to query the number of sex offenders by ZIP code. We ran the query for each of the ZIP codes along Chicago’s north lakefront. ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on February 7, 2011
This morning Joe Zekas, writing at Homeward Bound – West Suburbs, likened price cuts at Oak Brook’s Tower Condominiums to the “uncontrollable plummeting at a Tower of Terror.” That’s too good of a term to pass up, so I’m stealing it for a new regular feature on Yo. Edgewater’s high-rises seemed like a good place ...
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Posted by Joseph Askins on January 3, 2011