Seattle Bubble Forum Archive

Did a little looking today, both on Redfin and on the street, and found this place in Mountlake Terrace:

http://www.redfin.com/WA/Mountlake-Terr ... me/2672211

The neighborhood is fairly nice, mostly late 1950s to early 1960s, with the houses kept up pretty well. Size looks ok. I'm single, no kids/pets, so a 3br, 1ba, place is fine.

Thoughts?

Pictures do lie, but it appears to be well maintained.
However, it is described as a having an "avant garde bathroom remodel". Now that is scary.

Hi dls,

228th and 44th are pretty heavily travelled roads by people going through Terrace. I would do a full neighborhood review. Check to see how many of the homes surrounding the subject property are rentals.

I would also check the WASL test scores of the public schools. Even if you send your kids to private schools, the neighborhoods with higher scores tend to be more desirable and hold their values.

I'd also recommend checking the Snohomish County Sheriff's office website to see if there are any registered sex offenders living nearby.

One final thought. Terrace is home to many houses we call "blockers." Cinderblock built homes right after WWII for the servicemen coming home from the war. Make sure this one isn't a blocker fixed up pretty with new siding.

1964 was after the Worlds Fair and construction was a little better than the years just before. There is however a look of the house as though it is a double wide. It was economical construction, but good.
You are paying for the lot in that neighborhood at a price of $250K. It is a torch down roof which will need to be monitored and the insulation of the ceiling is done on the roof. What many people do is to is tear off the torch down, insulate in sheets and put on a metal roof.
You're a single guy you can do that yourself, it's a no brainer kind of thing.
Offer $250K see what happens.

A 3 bedroom place with an 8K SF lot for a single person? That's a lot to bite off. Do you expect a spouse and kids on the scene in the near future? Planning to take in a renter to help pay the mortgage?

As you might surmise, I think a 3BR place is rather ridiculous for a single person.

If you think a marriage is in your future, I'd suggest waiting (renting, saving) until you're ready to make that big purchase together. In my observation relationship dynamics are always thrown off-kilter by one partner moving into the other's territory; it takes an awful lot to transition from "my space" to "our space", particularly if that "my space" is owned.

My $0.02, since you were fool enough to ask for the advice of strangers on the Internet...

It looks unremarkable for the price to me, but this isn't a neighborhood I know a lot about, so I could be wrong there.

But: "place is fine"? In this market I don't think any of us should have to settle for fine. Wait for either greatness or a total steal for a situation in which you can add some quick equity.

I don't necessarily agree with Angie about a 3br being too much for a single person (my sister has just rented one in Maryland where she will start a new job, and one bedroom will become her office/guest room and another, which is tiny, will become a closet), but I absolutely concur that caution is warranted in case you may be getting married or shacking up within the next few years -- especially considering that prices are still falling. Many of us ladies find financial prudence extremely attractive.

So family of 5 in 4000sf house = McMansion, but single guy in 1100sf house = totally reasonable?

1100 SF for a single guy is perfectly reasonable. I had a 1300 sq ft house and that was too big (couple empty rooms), the 980 sq ft house was OK, but the living room was tiny (not big enough to have more than 2 or 3 guests over, really).

Cool, so the next time someone complains about "McMansions" I'll refer them back to this thread.

IMHO, people seem to have a weird, skewed view of how much space they "need."

I grew up in , and it never occurred to me that it was too small for our family of 5.

IMHO, people seem to have a weird, skewed view of how much space they "need."

Yes but I think that's changing. The smaller home is becoming a lot trendier, and very large homes are sitting on the market unsold. ...But only a couple of years ago the most sought after thing was the 3000+ sq ft home on a tiny lot.

To be clear, I don't think 1100sf is too much for a single guy, I just feel that there's a double standard.

I grew in a very small house, but never noticed it probably because we spent so much time out in the backyard. However, the weather is much better in the Bay Area, so I can't really blame people here for wanting a bigger house since they have to spend so much more time inside it.