Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Another Gem In Contract in Prospect Heights: 400 Park Place





You mean to tell us another $2M+ fixer-upper bites the dust in a patch of brownstone Brooklyn as highly-coveted as Prospect Heights without hitting the NYTimes, Streeteasy, Zillow, Trulia, or Brownstoner??  Welcome to the inefficient market that many buyers love to hate.  On Platinum Member radar in September a few days after it came out, 400 Park Place needed nothing but a for sale sign in the window to move this estate sale for top dollar by the time the word got out enough.  With an asking price of $2.1M, you didn't need to be a real estate whiz to know that comps justified the price.  Afterall, it's not like a fixer-upper hasn't sold in Prospect Heights for $3.1M this year.  And if you needed some hyper-local apples-to-apples comparison, then Platinum Members sniping 408 Park Place (coming up on a year ago now...) for $2.15M just 4 doors down should help solidify things for ya.

Yes, 400 Park Place was a no-brainer, and for a time it was also a tree falling in the forest with almost no one to hear it.  (More or less still is!)  This 18' x 45' 2-Family on the extra-deep 131' lot would be flying off the shelves above $2M immediately if Corcoran got their hands on it and snapped a pic or two, but it doesn't take Corcoran to move a property in this market.  As we predicted, high offers were low-balling early on.  To think, $1.7M was the high offer on this house for a time.  Heck, even if you KNEW this house was available, the listing firm was playing it real close to the vest and not exactly welcoming buyers either.  But then the real aggressive home buyers barged their way in, got their hands on it, and bids slid all the way up beyond asking price.  We had no concerns about the place appraising high enough, but waiving the financing contingency (as is becoming a customary aggressive move) was the winning term to seal the deal.  Whether you want a nice swath of back yardage...




Or parquet floors for days...




Or tin ceilings and wood everythang...












This house had it going on.  Another one of the countless examples of the inefficient Brooklyn marketplace at work.  Even the barely-marketed houses can't stay a secret for long.


Pro's:  prime fixer-upper with original details and a huge lot, not on everyone's radar, not being bid up by the masses, even floors under old carpet are bound to be well-intact, this year's house at last year's prices

Con's:  gone already, work to be done, over asking price, took waiving financing contingency to do it

Ideally:  gotta stay vigilant for jewels like these, and strike aggressively to take them down


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