purchaser of near-$1M Trinidad home is a Bloomingdale resident; comments on 45 Bryant NW, 2034 1st St NW, 74 Adams NW, 2314 1st NW

See this Urban Turf post about a Bloomingdale household that is purchasing a nearly $1 million house in Trinidad.   The Trinidad house purchaser identifies himself as Bloomingdale resident in the comments posted; he also comments on 45 Bryant Street NW, 2034 1st Street NW, 74 Adams Street NW and 2314 1st Street NW.
                                              

Trinidad’s (Almost) $1 Million Home Finds a Buyer

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• February 20, 2013

by UrbanTurf Staff

The highest priced home to be listed for sale in Trinidad has found a buyer. The six-bedroom house on Florida Avenue went under contract on Monday.
                                                 

After initially hitting the market for $926,500 on January 31st, the listing’s price was reduced on Valentine’s Day to $898,400 and then found a buyer five days later.

The 3,000 square-foot home has six bedrooms, 4.5 bathrooms, a large yard and a two-car garage. The final sales price won’t be available until the sale closes, but we will be curious to see how close it came to the asking price.

1. Buyer said at 1:42 pm on Thursday February 21, 2013:
   @Spectator,

   This is why my wife and I are under contract on it. $300/sq ft sure beats the heck out of anywhere in NW DC.  We are currently Bloomingdale residents.  We were hoping to buy another rowhouse in Bloomingdale, but the prices and competition forced us to look elsewhere.

   @LininginTrinidad, you are spot on.  Would people rather pay $500k+ for a 3/2 condo or ~$900k for a 6/4.5 house?  It is a no-brainer.

   We toured about 50 “renovated” properties and this one was the best by far.  The bedrooms and bathrooms were the most tastefully done, and it wasn’t even close.  The staging of the first floor was horrible, but my wife has 1,000 ideas to make it much more functional and defined.  Admittedly, the kitchen is a bit small, but definitely more than enough for us. 

   Our plan is to partition off the basement and make it a separate unit.  The pictures online don’t show the bedrooms or full bathroom down there.  Sure, it needs some rejiggering, but it will be perhaps the best looking English basement rental I’ve seen.

   After laboring through a home search, we are happy to find such a stunning place.  The price is a bit high, but you have no idea the amount of competition that exists out there.  If/when the Capitol Hill Oasis debacle is rectified, then this stretch of Florida will become highly desirable.  I would be open to working with neighbors and the city to find a good solution that remedies such buffoonery.

   We love DC and cannot wait to become part of our new neighborhood.  I sold my wife on the idea of Trinidad/H St and she cannot wait either!

1. B'Dale Res said at 2:40 pm on Thursday February 21, 2013:
   @Buyer
   Congrats on your new purchase.  I know of a few other Bloomingdale residents moving to that end of town because of the costs within Bloomingdale.  Luckily I was able to buy in Bloomingdale at a good price 3+ years ago…but I am still in the midsts of renovations.  So congrats on moving to a home in a changing area that won’t require a lot of work.

1. Buyer said at 4:35 pm on Thursday February 21, 2013:
   @B’Dale Res,

   Thank you. We were lucky enough to buy in 2010 before things got out of hand. The property needed a bit of work, but it had been modernized in the early 90s (and updated in the mid-2000s) so it wasn’t in need of substantial overhaul.  Glad we pulled the trigger when we did!  Hope your renovations wrap up soon.

   We found it hard to compete with developers putting in all-cash offers for the multi-family properties in Bloomingdale.  The recent properties on the market that have retained their true 2-family form were less than impressive (45 Bryant—horrible basement), caught in a bidding war (2034 1st St—same developer as 1228 Florida Ave NE) or snapped up by developers (2413 1st).

   The condo boom in the neighborhood really ticks us (and probably quite a few others) off, but it is almost impossible to beat an all-cash buyer who plans on slicing the 2-family into 3 condos (e.g. 74 Adams and now 2413 1st). 

   Hard to stomach leaving Bloomie, but we plan on maintaining our current property as a rental.

   For those of you dissing Trinidad, I would recommend you take a look at the broader picture.  Affordability drives people to the next closest neighborhood.  My wife and I could not afford a rowhouse in our preferred areas of Logan/U St/Columbia Heights in 2010, so we settled on Bloomingdale.  Many others followed the same reasoning and now look at it.

   The same thing has been happening in Trinidad.  People (and developers) get priced out of Capitol Hill/H St/NoMa/Near Northeast and are broadening their search.  We aren’t as early to the game in Trinidad, but the neighborhood still has not fully realized its value.  The stigma tied to the neighborhood is rapidly dissipating.  Commercial development is only a short way behind.  And is H St slowing down???  No way—only more developments are popping up.  Even properties south and east of the starburst are being snapped up like hotcakes.

   Developers are thirsty for properties and are driving up prices with no end in sight.  If you want a single-family or 2-family property, now is as good as it will get.  I went outside my comfort zone of paying for a turnkey property, but I have no buyer’s remorse.  A unique single-family (soon to be 2-family) property in a rapidly developing area?  I’ll take that all day long.

   My two cents for now.  Shilpi, as promised, you and I will have a more fulsome discussion once closing occurs.