624 White Street, Key West - Touched by History

The former home of Pulitzer Prize poet Elizabeth Bishop located at 624 White Street in Old Town Key West is now offered for sale for the first time since it was purchased from Ms. Bishop in 1946.  According to the listing Realtor, not me, the house has been kept it basically the same condition since it was purchased.

“It is very nice here; I wish so much that you and your mother could come here sometime, I am so sure you would like it. The sea is so beautiful– all spotted and striped, from dark black-blue to what my aunt calls ‘lettuce’ green.”

Elizabeth Bishop discovered Key West in the 1930s while on a fishing trip. She purchased the eyebrow house at 624 White Street which she owned until 1946 when she moved to Brazil. The house was built in 1889 at the eastern edge of Old Town. Her home faced the Army Barracks and the Battleship Maine cemetery. The Armory was located about 150 feet or so to the north. I dug into my old shoebox and found an aerial photo of the area from 1940 to which I added an arrow to show her home.

 Elizabeth Bishop’s home in Key West, Florida was designated a Literary Landmark in 1993. The ceremony was conducted at the 11th Annual Key West Literary Seminar. The plaque was unveiled by Pulitzer prize-winning poet, and close friend of Bishop, James Merrill.

In his book The Houses of Key West  Alex Cammerer wrote about his first visit to Key West which turned into a love affair with the architecture of Old Town. He referred to eyebrow houses simply stating "with their front porch roofs extending demurely over the second-story windows, hence the term eyebrows. I have discovered that they are unique to Key West and are not found anywhere else in the country." I have blogged about many of the eyebrow homes in Key West. I have learned that no two are the same design and construction.  According to the Monroe County Property Appraiser this home has 1336 sq ft of interior living space plus porches. The home has three bedrooms and two bathrooms. The interiors feature Dade County Pine wood walls, ceiling, and floors.

The "modern" kitchen is located in an addition at the rear of the house and was added subsequent to Bishop's departure. 

I am always amazed at house new renovations treat the second floor bedrooms to create function sleeping spaces and add or update existing bathrooms. The roof lines must be preserved to maintain the architectural integrity of the original home.

The 6,030 square foot lot measures 67' X 90'. There is more than adequate room in the rear for a large pool plus updating of the rear porch into interior living space and perhaps the addition of a new porch or deck at the rear.

 CLICK HERE to view the Key West MLS datasheet on 624 White Street, Key West offered for sale at $1,200,000. Then please call me Gary Thomas, 305-766-2642, to schedule a private showing.  I am a buyers agent and a full time Realtor at Preferred Properties Key West. This is exactly the kind of property buyers interested in renovation project are interested in.  It will probably go under contract in a matter of days.

Cry Me a River!

I was searching the Internet yesterday and found a story about a local crazy lady who lost her home in foreclosure. Before readers call out "misogyny" understand that I am going to tell you about an equally crazy man. In fact I am going to tell you three short tales about how people who lost their homes through foreclosure casting themselves as victims of the foreclosing party.

Case Number One - Madam X.  Madam X owned a very well located Conch House on a good block in the Heart of Old Town Key West. She owned the house for many years and made numerous changes to it without obtaining building permits. I wrote about this house a couple of times when it was listed for sale but did not disclose all that I knew about the things the madam had done including creating two additional living units which she illegally rented on a transient basis. She had created a separate living space for herself at the rear of the house which she shared with pets. Lots of pets. It reeked of pets.

Madam X listed her home for sale with a couple of very good agents over the years. One of the agents is among the five top producers in Key West. I had a buyer who made several offers to buy the house at full asking price, waived all inspections, agreed to pay all title fees, and close on a date convenient to the madam so as to ease her removal from the house. The madam refused that offer.  The real estate agent told me others had made similar offers to no avail. Madam X an answer to the foreclosure lawsuit which dragged the proceeding out for several years.
during the interim, interest continued to accrue, the lender paid the real property taxes and put force-place insurance on the house so as to protect lender's investment. 

The Clerk of the Court finally auctioned off the house a couple of years ago. Some people cried out blaming the liberals for gentrifying Key West and making the cost of living too high for older locals like Madam X, Some complained about all of the houses that have become vacation rentals that create wealth for absentee owners. (I guess those folks were unaware the madam, herself, rented her house on a weekly basis and benefited from all the income but who did not pay her bills.)  Nobody blamed the madam.  My buyer offered a million cash for the house. I think the Clerk of Court sold it somewhere in the $600,000 range.

Case Number Two - Dowager Queen. Longtime readers may recall that I used to be a lawyer and for a few years worked the special assets departments for a couple of banks in Denver. I was a worker bee at one and the manager at the other.  A woman I will call The Dowager Queen was the widow of one of Denver's most respected members of society in the 1950s to 1970s.  I went to law school with one of his sons. The queen had money but for some reason refused to pay the mortgage on her home. I started foreclosure. She called up and said something like Do you know who I am?  I said I did. She said I needed to stop and warned me that if I didn't, she would go to the newspapers and TV stations and cry about what I was doing to her. I told her to go ahead. Instead, she called the president of my bank who called me into his office to question what was going on. I explained and he said to carry on. A few days later my former law school classmate called me and asked if we could work out a deal. He said his mother was nuts and said he would pay off the loan. I gave him time and he did.

Case Number Three - Mr. Green. Mr. Green was a paraplegic Viet Nam veteran confined to a wheelchair.  He borrowed money from our bank to renovate a house for his special needs. Then he refused to repay the loan even though he had income and resources to do so. I talked to him on the phone. He told me he would tell the world about how awful I was. I told him I sympathized with his life situation  but said he had to repay his loan. I continued the foreclosure and ended up taking possession of the house a few months later. I vaguely remember meeting a locksmith at the property to gain access.

It was surprised to see how much damage a man in a wheelchair could do. He removed all the kitchen cabinets and appliances, light fixtures, light switches and plugs, as well as all bathroom fixtures except the toilets which were filled with s***.

Each of these people created a world in which they were the victims of a bank that loaned them money and then which demanded it be repaid.  I have a load of similar stories of borrowers who blamed the bank for their woes including a former Denver police detective who claimed a bank loan officer got him drunk and made him borrow money.

723 Catherine Street, Key West - Just Sold

Just SOLD, but not by me, 723 Catherine Street, Key West. I wrote about this property a couple of times over the past few years and showed it to several prospective buyers. Let me share a bit of what I previously wrote.

723 Catherine Street in 1965

From a bottling plant to a contemporary gem, this former cola bottling plant was converted in 1995 into a spacious, open, modern home and is a recipient of the prestigious Ceramic Star for Architectural Preservation Excellence. Lush gardens surround a beautiful pool with a waterfall, an outdoor shower and a large poolside loggia that is great for dining and entertaining. High privacy walls insure peace and quiet. There are three large bedrooms and two and a half baths equipped with elegant modern fixtures. Inside the ceilings soar in the first floor living areas. The gourmet kitchen opens over a breakfast bar to the great room. This property is in the low-flood-hazard x zone.

 This home has 2356 sq ft of living space and sits on a 3939 sq ft lot. The property definitely has a New York loft type of feel to me. The building is concrete and the floors are decorative concrete. Even though the walls and floors and glass are hard surfaces, the house does not give off what I'll call hard vibes. The simple lines, warm colors, high ceilings, and spacious rooms make this home inviting, not harsh. The open courtyards and pool off the living areas remind you right away that you are not on the Isle of Manhattan but the Island of Key West instead.

I dug down into my old shoebox and found the black and white aerial photo taken of St Mary's Star  of the Sea church and convent in the 1950s. The convent burned down a few years later. I added a check to mark the location of 723 Catherine Street.  If you are familiar with this part of town you will appreciate all of the new construction and historic preservation that has taken place over the past six decades. One of the challenges in selling this property was its location across the street from the Suburban Propane tank farm. It's time for that thing to be relocated to another island. It has had a negative influence on many other sales over the years. The thing that changed the dynamics was the acquisition of a transient rental license. The owner had successfully rented the property as a monthly vacation rental. But a transient license makes that property (and any other property in close proximity of Duval Street) a money making prospect.

The property was sold in 1994 for $132,500. The recent owner/seller purchased it in 1998 for $490,000. It CLOSED yesterday for $1,842,500.  I am not good at math and I know someone who is will correct me. But I think that is a 386.2% gain or an annual gain of 18.3%.  Plus the owner/seller had the use and or income of the property for the past 21 years. It kind of beats owing a CD. CLICK HERE to view the Key West MLS datasheet on this property. Congrats to the listing and selling agents.

Are You a Spic?

I am a big fan of using images to help me replay images in my mind from when I was a child.

One of the defining moments of my life occurred at the North Drive-in Theater in Denver, Colorado  sometime when I was around seven or eight years old.  My parents and I went to the North Drive-in Thereat located in Thornton, a new northern suburb of an ever-expanding Denver

The time would have been around 1954 or so. I am not exactly sure about the year, but I remember what happened with absolute clarity.

There was a children's playground located just below the big screen.  My parents were sitting in our green 1952 Studebaker car. I went to the playground to play on the teeter-totter or merry-go-round until what-ever movie started.

I started to play with a kid my age. He was a Mexican. I figured that out. He was brown skinned. We were having fun until I asked him "Are you a Spic?"

He immediately left me. I was puzzled.  What had I said?

I grew up in a family of Rednecks from Missouri.  Baptists!  I heard the most vile words about other people out of my Mother's mouth.  My Dad didn't say those hateful words - mostly.

The current President of the United States is saying hateful things about others.  I did not know any better when I was a child. He and I are basically the same age now. Okay, he is a year older. He is supposed to be smarter. I figured out that I really hurt that little boy. I have never forgotten what I said or the impact it had on him.

Key West Border Patrol Incident

This is a true story.

Sometime during the spring of 2007 the US Border Patrol started to aggressively round-up illegal aliens in the Key West area. I remember one episode that made the front page of our local paper, The Key West Citizen.  It involved the raid on a hotel next to the Home Depot which was being renovated. The contractor had many illegals working on the site. This raid got a lot of locals riled up because of how aggressive it was. And it made illegals very cautious.

That same week I had workers making some repairs at my house. The workers included a man from South Africa, a carpenter from England, two day laborers from Nicaragua (who did not speak English),  an electrician from Ireland, a painter from Poland, and a tile setter also from Poland.

It was around lunchtime a few days after the Border Patrol raid.  The workers were sitting under the palm trees outside by my pool eating lunch. Like many of the homes in the Casa Marina Area where I live, my house has a large privacy fence.  Someone opened the gate without ringing the bell.  All of the workers eyes looked to the north end of the pool and saw male wearing a uniform enter the yard. Everybody but me scrambled and ran out the gate on the south side of the pool where we were congregated.

It took me a minute to figure out that the workers had confused the Orkin Man with a Border Patrol agent. The workers finally made it back to work, but checked over their shoulder for days to come.

Recent SOLD Bank Owned Homes in Key West

I have written three blogs since the first of January which discussed bank owned homes in Key West. I thought readers would like to see the actual price the banks received. Let's take a look. Click the address to read the blog. This will help readers appreciate the bargain the buyers got - well that two buyers got.

3222 Riviera Drive, Key West. Offered at $1,190,000. SOLD at $1,225,000. Multiple offers. Sold immediately.

1200 Whitehead Street, Key West. Offered at $912,000. SOLD at $1,351,000. Multiple offers. Sold immediately.

909 Southard Street, Key West. Originally offered at $629,900 and reduced to $614,900. SOLD at $597,000.  This house has a good location on an excellent street. It had a small lot and no off street parking. It needed work - a lot of work.

I realize that a lot of prospective buyers think that they can get a "deal" by buying a bank owned property. Some buyers do get deals. Some actually show up at the courthouse steps and bid on properties when the county sheriff sells them. That's always risky. Very risky.  I don't care how many sales presentations you go to hosted by tv personalities, buying something you have not been inside or have legal knowledge about can be perilous. Banks and foreclosing law firms do make mistakes and buying blindly is fraught with disaster. But sometimes buyers who take big risks get big rewards.

I think it makes more sense to work with a knowledgeable and experienced Realtor when buying any property but especially when buying some other person's loss. There is normally a reason why a person lost a property to a bank instead of selling it himself.

1115 Southard Street, Key West - PRICE REDUCED

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever. Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness."

                                                                                                                                       John Keats

I first wrote about 1115 Southard Street in Key West back in March.  I was genuinely taken by this beautiful house. Take look at the same house in the black and white photo below which was taken in 1965.  This home is an example of a Key West eyebrow style home. The roof eaves extend out over the porch protecting the second floor windows from rain or wind. In the days before air conditioning, residents had to rely on natural ventilation and trees to provide cooling. When you think about it, eyebrows really don't keep wind or rain out of your eyes - it's the eyelids, but that's not as romantic sounding.

I searched the Historic Sanborn Fire Maps and learned it appeared in the 1889 Map when it was then numbered 514 Southard Street. The house number changed to 1115 Southard Street on the 1899 Map. The Sanborn Map also identified the lane behind this house as Barracks Lane which was renamed Stump Lane on the 1899 Map.

I dug down into my old shoebox and found the above aerial photo taken of the area where I identified 1115 Southard Street. Study the photo and you may recognize the tall building at the corner. That is the Armory. The Army Barracks was located across the street to the right. The houses in the foreground are in The Meadows Area of modern day Key West.

I paused at the front door and felt a sense of anticipation before entering this home. The house exterior is strikingly handsome. The grounds are very well maintained. In fact the yard maintenance guys where clipping and blowing when I saw the property.

I have written before that every eyebrow house I have been inside is different from the rest. This is as good an example of a variation as any I have seen. Though varied in size, eyebrow houses were typically built with a center staircase rising to the second floor where there would have been two bedrooms on either side. Downstairs there would have been Dade County Pine walls on either side of the staircase with bedrooms or sitting rooms followed by a kitchen in the rear. In many instances the kitchen might have been an addition to the house.

As soon as I entered this house I recognized the renovations would have been made in the 1980s. The interior first floor Dade Pine walls were removed. Additions were made to the east and west sides of the house where a bit of space was added but more importantly that space introduced ambient daytime light. This type of addition would never be allowed by our Historic Architectural Review Commission (HARC). They put the kibosh on just about anything innovative. Saltillo tile floors were a big deal in decorating four decades ago - not so much now. The original ceiling was replaced by a new wood ceiling. The wood theme is carried throughout the house.

The renovation architecture is interesting.  But it's dated. That does not mean it is bad. It means a buyer who wants either a more historic looking home or a home with current contemporary features will have to renovate.

The staircase to the second floor was relocated to the backside of the living room wall where the sofa is located. The staircase lands directly into the master suite which includes the bedroom, a niched study, closets, bathroom, and exit to the glorious private roof top deck. The architect who designed this house did a damned good job. A dormer lifted and extended the back end of the second floor. (Modern day HARC would never allow this. And that's a shame. Note the original roof line was captured and noted in the built-in closets which have an ascending line that bisects the new from the old. The past is preserved.)

I stood on the second floor deck and took in the view which I found so charming. The old house next door looks delightfully deplorable. It will be offered for sale some day. It sits on  a huge L-shaped lot with access on Southard Street as well as Stump Lane (as does 1115 Southard). It will sell for way over a million dollars. In the meantime (which could be ten years or longer), the house will just sit there exuding its potential.

The house has 1400 square feet of interior living space under air plus covered porches, decks, and patios. The two guest bedrooms have baths, one of which is in the cute cottage at the rear. A gate at the rear opens out to Stump Lane. The 4,939 square foot lot measures 50.3' X 97.5'. The pool is both sunny and enormous by Old Town standards. 

The asking price on 1115 Southard Street, Key West, was just reduced to $1,000,000. CLICK HERE to view the Key West MLS datasheet and listing photos. Then please call me, Gary Thomas, 305-766-2642. to schedule a private showing. I am a buyers agent and a full time Realtor at Preferred Properties Key West.