Lately there's been a little too much room for cars on our street.
Normally it's nuts to buts attempting to park.
I don't have a car, but living down here for seven years I know that if you're not home and parked by 6:30, you'll be parking on the next block.
Something wasn't adding up.
Coincidentally, the trash on the parkway has dropped dramatically.
It wasn't until I walked east toward Stony Island and looked at the building next to the Astor Properties debacle did I figure it out:
It's empty.
I haven't seen anyone parking in front of or going in or out of the building in the past two weeks.
Because I normally take the Metra to work, I rarely pass by the other end of the block. But when I put my thinking cap on, it all made sense.
I bet you that building is going condo.
And as we all know, depending on who buys the units and/or who moves in that may or may not be a good thing for the 'hood.
If the Astor Properties building is any indication, we may have another weed choked yard in the near future.
I'll keep you posted.
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4 comments:
Who is dumb enough to take a building condo right now? I would not be optimistic.
Sounds more like the building may be in foreclosure, and with the foreclosure pipeline as clogged as it is, it could be quite some time before the place is processed.
I doubt it's converting, unless the plans were on the table 3 years ago, and in any case new developments are being cxl'd everywhere. No new developments are getting financed.
You and your neighbors need to know immediately who the beneficial owner of this property is, so that you know who to hold responsible for maintenance and security. This is major. You must ride herd on the ownership to make sure this property does not become an eyesore and a major threat to public safety.
The neighborhood early warning site (NEWs) http://www.newschicago.org/ and everyblock http://chicago.everyblock.com/ can be useful for some info on properties. The NEWs site's info tends to be a bit dated as property transfers can take a while to get posted.
I would sort of doubt it was a foreclosure unless the building was foreclosed some time ago. The courts and sheriffs office seems to recognize that tossing out renters is often quite an issue. Sadly, everyblock recently added a foreclosure category so now you can see recent foreclosures in your area.
Without knowing the exact block or size/type of building it is tough to figure out if anything on everyblock matches, but there are a number of foreclosures that look like they may be for 3 flats in the area.
They might have closed the building first, pursuant to converting the place, then lost their financing, and are likely in foreclosure or close to it.
You can look up the property online at Cook County records to determine ownership,and you can also obtain the loan history of the building there. But you have to pay something like 50 cents a document to download the documents, which might be worth doing if you are pursuing the ownership of the building. It is REALLY worth doing if you are buying a place.
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