Update: See the house above in November of 2022 (last photo).

It’s interesting to see how property values have risen to such a level in some neighborhoods such as Benton Park and many parts of South St. Louis that even once extremely dilapidated houses are now highly valuable. I checked back in one some houses in that neighborhood and saw some dramatic changes. The old wood frame house above, which I saw during the beginnings of its renovation, looks to be nearing completion. I looked at it and many of the others in this post back in July of 2020; this one is the above is in the last photo of that post; it will probably sell for over $200,000.

Holy moly! The house above and below, which is in the first photo of the aforementioned post from July of 2020 is now selling for a huge amount of money. Thomas Hardie would be proud. This was originally a very small central hall Greek Revival house in the old George Schneider Addition.

Moving along, I have two photos below of the progress of construction on what had been a total disaster of a house on the west side of Indiana Avenue north of Arsenal Street. You can see what it used to look like in this post from September of 2021 (third image down).

I’m not surprised this is happening here. Without major subsidies from the federal government, affordable housing–like this house was originally back in the 1860s when it was built out in the suburbs–increasingly is not going to be possible in neighborhoods where the average home price is north of $200,000. I suspect this house will sell for around $300,000 when it is complete.

Back over south of Arsenal Street in Benton Park, I spotted this wood frame survivor. I wonder what it will look like in ten years–will it have been bought by a rehabber/flipper and have a price tag of over $400,000? It’s very possible.