Bummer. The Buckyhouse went pending after just a few days on the market. No more open houses.
I think someone bought it for the beautiful wooded lot
Me too, cb. It is within the R1 zone, septic not sewer, so 1.5 acre lot, if I recall the listing information correctly, can be subdivided easily into two lots. The Buckyhouse gets a small piece, and a new mega house of 4,000 sft gets the larger piece. Land in that part of the area goes for $250-$500k per lot, unimproved. It does not have a street appeal as it sits on a weird drive. I just wanted to see how the darn thing was put together!
Hi cb, thought of you when I saw the design in this house: http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-170046483-4454_Osprey_St_San_Diego_CA_92107 They keep lowering the price but it’s not selling!
That’s a beautiful house, and the staging is fabulous.
I was all set to make an offer until I saw the vessel sinks in the bathrooms.
“I was all set to make an offer until I saw the vessel sinks in the bathrooms.”
:)) :)) Looks like we both suffer from allergies to vessel sinks?!
Who wants to clean the outside of a sink? And that narrow little crack beneath those slanted exterior surfaces? I’m all about functional design. Plus it makes the counter too low or the sink too high. Design trend that needs to die.
^You nailed it! Ditto free standing tubs. Cleaning outside of a toilet is enough. 
When my grandpa was a kid he had a toilet that you didn’t have to clean the outside of…
Whose fence is that blocking the view of the water?
If whoever renovated the house put that up, they are crazy.
I don’t know why it isn’t selling. That Osprey house was flipped by one of my key competitors that, frankly, has made several mistakes over the years paying too high for properties. If I know he is offering on a house I’m interested in I make sure I don’t follow him down a hole.
He works with the agent that was listing the Chicken house. I have learned that he is a terrible agent, not communicating at all. He hypes up and claims that the house will sell for X all fixed up. He is always way high and I don’t listen to him at all. I think this other guy listens to him and lists way too high.
I think the issue is the house has limited views and other houses could go up 2 stories around it and block the views. Probably should be priced around 1.55 mil.
The chicken house finally closed at $980,000. http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-170007880-1407_Santa_Barbara_St_San_Diego_CA_92107 That is far below the original listing. Cb - I don’t remember what you were offering but wasn’t it in this ballpark?
It was originally listed at $1.350 million, according to Redfin, on 2/15.
Went under agreement on 4/10, but doesn’t show any price drops. I can’t remember if there were any.
The Chicken House is the one where I got very frustrated and upset with the listing agent. He is now officially a Slimeball with a capital S to me. He’s the one that wouldn’t return my calls or communicate. Here’s the full story as a reminder.
I met with the agent and toured the house and made a written offer at $950,000. I had a long conversation with him and asked him if he would represent me as buyer (double commission for him). Then I point blank asked if he was representing any other buyers in the transaction…No was his answer. He told me there were a couple of other offers from other agents, but they hadn’t even visited the property so he wasn’t going to consider them. They would play the inspection/ credit game.
After about 3 more weeks on the market, I kept calling for updates. He claimed he was waiting patiently for the owners to realize the house was not worth $1.35 million. Meanwhile my agent (the woman I work with on my listings) did a lot of analysis and was very excited about the property. And…I knew the big tree across the street, that was partially obstructing a big ocean view, was dead and going to be torn down.
So, I called back and asked to do a thorough inspection with my carpenter. I spent a long time at the house crawling around and had a long talk with the agent (who was supposed to be representing me) and sent a written email raising my offer to $965k. He went dark and I kept asking him to write it up.
About a week later I see it went Pending in the MLS. He didn’t even bother to call me…His Client !!! It is common courtesy to call your client and explain why your offer was not accepted. When he finally answered my call, he said “Well, when the Seller saw your final offer they finally agreed to take the other solid offer which was higher”. I ask “how much higher??” About 40k he says. I smell a rat.
After 30 days the transaction is still Pending and I call him up to inquire if there were issues with the escrow. Told him I was still interested if there was trouble with the other Buyer. He gives me a total lie story “I have no idea what is going on. The Seller is working directly with the Buyer and I’m out of the loop”. Baloney…there isn’t an agent on Earth that isn’t anxiously working a transaction because their commission is at stake. He knows nothing??
Meanwhile someone is working on the property, dumpsters, landscape all pulled out, back concrete patio demolished out, and they are painting over all the termite damaged wood (without repairing the damage) It’s absolutely odd, why would a Seller let a new buyer do that? Why would a buyer start work without owning the property? I keep checking County Recorder for some kind of ownership change, or a lien on property or something. For awhile I thought the Seller had made a deal with Renovation Realty who fix up your house and then sell it. But they don’t start work without placing a lien on the property for the renovation costs.
And, I forgot to mention that this same listing agent has worked for another flipper in the neighborhood who gets himself in trouble every now and then. He is the flipper of the remodeled listing on Osprey and the listing agent is the agent selling that house. This other flipper was next door when I visited the Chicken House and I inquired whether he was offering on Chicken House also. He said…“Ohh I don’t know, he has so many LLC entities, I wouldn’t know” I go home and research, the agent just helped the flipper buy the house on Bermuda next door (and he paid way too much for the property. What a fiasco!!
So I patiently wait for months and months, constantly watching the work, checking the listing, checking title company data and County Recorder records.
Finally, I see a Grant Deed selling to blah blah LLC in the County records. I don’t recognize the entity but after some detective work, I find the other flipper is sole member of the LLC. I am livid, just livid. Any agent representing me should have the common decency to call up and say, " the owner is considering a higher offer, would you like to consider making a stronger offer?" He used me solely to create a set of offers in the lower $960-980k range to convince the Seller to sell to his client. I’ve seen the game before and I’ve played the game before. I was only $20k off and he should’ve given me a chance to match it.
Then he played games updating the listing in the MLS system. It sold Sept 8, but he never marked it Sold until about the 15th. And he marked it sold Sept 1 which doesn’t match legal records. I think he was hesitating because he has to enter the buyer’s agent into the MLS during the update to close the transaction. He probably knew I would research. So he marked it sold by his young “assistant” who I know is just in training and holds Open Houses only.
Ugghhhh,he’s a total slimeball and I’ve told anyone in the neighborhood that will listen. Now Marilyn knows to never deal with him after this ginormous post:)
See Post 623 for the house the other flipper is trying to sell. He also has been working on a house on Bermuda Circle for over a year
What a bunch of slimeballs.
I seem to get a higher percent of these types than anyone else I know.
What was the deal with painting over the termite damage without repairing it? If they flip the house isn’t that illegal? You should document this and blow the whistle on them.
It’s not illegal. Many people paint over damaged areas on the exterior of their house. This particular property had severe termite damage in the wood vaulted interior ceilings (from years of roof leaking). I saw them spraying the ceilings with white paint so I know they didn’t repair them. Any buyer in the future is going to have a termite inspection and then it will be fumigated. Not sure if a buyer and/or home inspector is going to get on a really tall ladder and note that the ceiling wood is spongy
This is the house where I reported 3 inch conical piles of termite poop/ debris all around the house…coming from damaged ceilings.