What will $250,000 buy you these days?
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be looking around the six regions of the Chicago, as defined in our Quick Guide – Loop / downtown, the North Side, the Far North side, the Northwest Side, the West / Southwest Side and the South Side – to see what kinds of new-construction homes and gut rehabs are selling around the $250s.
One $250,000 home is still available at Absolute Builders’ Grand Briar Condominiums, a project I just happened to be checking on earlier this week. It’s been nine months since anyone at Yo has mentioned this conversion at 433 W Briar Pl in Lakeview East, long enough for the development to undergo one significant change.
As you can tell from the video posted below, The Habitat Company had been marketing this project. Sometime in the past nine months, Barbara O’Connor’s team at Baird & Warner took over its listings. The development has a new Web site that features price points and availability information for every unit, as well as floor plans and a slideshow tour.
The one $250,000 home for sale at Grand Briar is a one-bedroom / one-bath corner unit on the first floor, adjacent to the lobby and across the hall from the building’s elevator. Its rooms are arranged in a bit of a shotgun style, as the 8-5″ x 12-7″ bedroom is accessible from the living area only by walking through the enclosed kitchen.
Most of the units in the building are two- and three-bedroom condos priced from the $460s to the $890s. Every home can be delivered in 60 days.
A ground-floor unit won’t have lake views, but its buyer will have easy access to the lake itself – according to Google Maps, Grand Briar is about two-tenths of a mile from Belmont Harbor. Laura Louzader of The North Coast blog described the building as “a typical, beautiful 1920s vintage classical revival” and said it was her “fave building in the city, has been for 20 years.” Commenter George said in November that he had lived in the building prior to the conversion and wasn’t impressed with the changes being made.