The second of two homes presently for sale in our neighbor hood is, perhaps, the better of the two, but I can't — for the life of me — understand why someone would buy a dog and try to turn it into a cat… if you want a mission-style or "tuscan" home, buy one.
This home is much cleaner, but some obvious non-Eichler bits stand out. When I go into a house nowadays, I can't look at "potential", I immediately glom onto the things that are "wrong". Perhaps this is a "glass-half-empty" way to look at it, but the Eichler home has such a prescribed aesthetic that it's easier to point out the things that are not right nor original… to that point, some things we noticed:
- Colonial baseboards
- Louvered bi-fold closet doors
- Stucco-ed exterior (?!?) with questionable paint scheme
- Enclosed Atrium (although nicely done… looks like a 60's fix)
- Ceramic tile throughout (I counted 9 different types)
- Enclosed Bath Door (bummer)
- An enlarged kitchen (no multipurpose room)… which actually
works in this model if you do want a huge kitchen more than a formal
living room and den. - Also, Wilson is a busy street — busier than you might imgine
However, it wasn't a toxic dump and the Realtor was actually quite cordial, which was a stark contrast to the house on Phoenix. And some good things:
- You could actualy move in without having to sanitize everything or rip any nastiness out
- The radiant heat seems like it's in working order
- Neighbors are great (Bret and Mary Peyton are the back-neighbors and John Paul and Hido live a few doors down)
- Back yard is a clean slate
However, at $395, it's higher than the other house and it's a flip (someone bought it 90 days ago for much, much less) — so there's some loan restrictions. There's some things here that would be hard to reverse (like removing all that tile and stucco) and you're potentialy paying for someone else's bad decisions… So, as much as it's weird to know that "Jeff sucks dick", the house on Phoenix might be a better buy, methinks…
Anyway, some pictures:
I actually like that shower pan, as it is the original. The one in my house has had that bathroom epoxy pain treatment. Eichler sure didn’t know what he was doing when it came to bathrooms…
Jeff G.
” if you want a mission-style or “tuscan” home, buy one.”
I had this this similar experience with my neighbor yesterday, she was talking about how awful Eichlers are and “what was he thinking”, she is a renter, then she mentioned she wanted to buy the house, ugh!. I didn’t want to say anything too defensive, I offered to lend her the Eichler book and share information about the architecture but she was not interested. She has other plans for the property if she buys it, how disappointing : (