Speaking of Ballard… cue the Twilight Zone music… it’s really quite eerie how every month the “angles” in local rags seem to be so in sync. Apparently this month all the clever reporters are focusing in on everyone’s favorite neighborhood: Ballard.
Cynthia Creasey and Mack McCoy bought a four-bedroom house in Ballard in 1988 for $116,000. She loved its spaciousness, its lush garden and the suburban feel of their neighborhood.
But McCoy, who grew up in Manhattan, longed for the city life. So the couple recently decided on a lifestyle change — and reaped a financial windfall in the process. They sold the house for $700,000, bought a two-bedroom condominium downtown for $450,000 and pocketed the difference.
Although the headline is “Ballard house turns into a pot of gold,” apparently not everything about this couple’s wallet-filling journey has been coming up roses:
Although Creasey, 53, and McCoy, 51, have showed and sold many condominiums as part of their work, actually moving from a four-bedroom house into a two-bedroom condo was daunting.
Squeezing into the cozy condo on Denny Way, between First and Second avenues, meant getting rid of about a quarter of their accumulated furniture and collections and putting much of the rest in a rented storage unit. The condominium includes garage parking for one vehicle, but McCoy had to lease a parking space nearby for their second car.
The condo has plenty of windows, but no air conditioning. During a recent stretch of hot weather, the wide-open windows let in fresh air, but also traffic and street noise that kept Creasey awake some nights.
Overwhelming pity wells up from deep within.
(Kathy Mulady, Seattle P-I, 07.07.2006)