This house is located at 1248 Fairmont Street, NW:
The listing says:
“Developer/Investor alert! Golden opportunity for development potential. Grand Victorian on premium extra wide corner lot (5,000 sq ft). Wonderful wrap-around porch, exquisite paneled DR w/ beamed ceiling, remodeled SS kitchen, beautiful ornate FP mantel, tin ceilings, parquet flrs, in-law suite, scenic view, Sold “as is.”
You can see more photos here.
This 6 bed/3.5 bath is going for $955,000.
looks like a haunted mansion
It’ll be sad to see it chopped up into condos
I’d kill for this house. It’s awesome. I hope they don’t chop it up, but they probably will.
From the outside, it does not look like a grand Victorian, in fact, it doesn’t look like an example of a show-stopping Victorian at all. The kitchen is absolutely ridiculous and not at all in keeping with the rest of the house. The wrap-around porch, while it wraps around, does not call out to me. I have seen Victorian wrap-arounds and they are filmworthy. This one is not. Anyway, it doesn’t matter because it will either become a groups house or turned into condos, sadly.
Seems low for such an enormous house. Is it surrounded by public housing on three sides or something?
I have a buddy that lives that on 11th and Fairmont. While not the worst area of CH, the area certainly has issues. 14th and Fairmont is known as a troubled corner, meaning riff-raff hangs out there all day/all night throughout the summer looking for trouble to start.
Unless I missed something, the photos were mysteriously devoid of any bathroom, basement, exterior rear photos. I’m guessing the “as-is” condition may be something to consider — so despite the size and nice corner lot, I suspect it’s priced high. I do love the parquet floors, though!
I used to live in this house. So, I have a few thoughts to offer on the price.
1) The place has been used as a group house for years, so I’m sure it’s got a handful of issues in maintenance related to that.
2) It’s not really six bedrooms, but more like five and a den. There’s a basement unit with a single bedroom; there are three bedrooms on the second floor, each of which is interconnected with the other two bedrooms by doors; and the third floor has two rooms, but the outer one is a “den” which isn’t enclosed. The basement unit also doesn’t have a C of O, if I recall correctly, which might reduce its functionality some.
3) That said, it’s a great house. The kitchen was updated within the last 6-8 years, but the rest of the place is full of great original details. I loved living there, and kind of wish I were in a position to buy it now.
I think this is a really cool looking place, particularly the rooms with all the wood. It would be a lot more stunning, however, if they painted the outside some interesting colors to make it “pop.” I know the brick is original, but it’s blah.
Painting that brick is just too awful of a suggestion to believe! It’s a beautiful brick home not a “poping out” fun house. Have some class people.
you’re calling someone classless for suggesting brick be painted?
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. that makes me want to paint all the brick.
5:13 can you explain your “reasoning”. I’m sure it will be enlightening.
i don’t really want to paint all the brick. 4:58 just sounds pompously uptight, so i laughed.
It is kind of a mirror image of the house at the other end it to the south. It can be as nice as the othere i suppose
Please don’t paint it. They’ll just paint it the usually boring gray after they’ve chopped it up to into condos and taken out all the walls and destroyed the woodwork.
The zoning here is R4. You need one parking spot for every two condo units. This building has no parking. Therefore, you could only convert it to condos by adding a curb cut for a driveway or going to BZA for a zoning variance. Neither are easy and both take months and months. I wouldn’t be surprised if this gets kept as a house. It’s not a good candidate for condos.
Actually it’s a great candidate for condos since many other large homes are chopped up and turned into condos. Now the zoning issues (needing to have it re-zoned) might be a temporary obstacle but how many other SFH have turned into condos? Can’t be that difficult a process or it would never be done considering the number of SFH (started out that way) that have been changed over to condos.
It has nothing to do with the fact that it’s a SFH. It has everything to do with the fact that it’s R4 with no parking.
Dave,
Here is the description taken directly from DC office of zoning for R4, I don’t see anything mentioned about parking or lack of parking.
Permits matter-of-right development of single-family residential uses (including detached, semi-detached, row dwellings, and flats), churches and public schools with a minimum lot width of 18 feet, a minimum lot area of 1,800 square feet and a maximum lot occupancy of 60% for row dwellings, churches and flats, a minimum lot width of 30 feet and a minimum lot area of 3,000 square feet for semi-detached structures, a minimum lot width of 40 feet and a minimum lot area of 4,000 square feet and 40% lot occupancy for all other structures (20% lot occupancy for public recreation and community centers); and a maximum height of three (3) stories/forty (40) feet (60 feet for churches and schools and 45 feet for public recreation and community centers). Conversions of existing buildings to apartments are permitted for lots with a minimum lot area of 900 square feet per dwelling unit. Rear yard requirement is twenty (20) feet.