Is buying/renovating this a bad idea? I like the building style for some fuckin reason I think it used to be an old library. its in the 100 year flood zone and there's that old tree next to it and bees live inside. It was last leased out like 15 years ago. Also the location is shitty and I would never be able to resell it. Am I the only one retarded enough to want to own this building? Maybe I could get it super cheap then.
It's impossible to say without knowing what your plans are for it. I'd definitely try to turn it into an apartment block and rent it out for income, but the zoning may not permit it. And dealing with muni govt can be a pain. I just got my blueprint approved for a small apartment and it took about a year and a half. Plus, if it's a historical building like mine was, you may have significant restrictions on what you can do to it.
However, if you can, might be a good deal. Post some numbers up and I can help you analyze your returns.
its not explicitly a historical building but if i wanted to make it one i think i could
its definitely not residential apartment type area. i would lease space to artists and maybe run a club. the ground level windows worry me.
there are no numbers, no property value assessment, no tax history. its been transfered from federal agency to federal agency to a local economic zone and literally only had 1 tenant for a short time in like 60 years. it was built in like the 20s by fed Department of Engineering that doesnt exist anymore... that makes me hopeful about the structure. anyway its viability as a business or resale is low, I would probably end up living there and killing hookers.
location has no meaningful traffic, its between a road and some chemical plant, but lower elevation than the road and blocked by other buildings. yeah thats what terrifies me, i will be stuck with it forever then die in it and be found by kids breaking in.
i fucking love Nick's real estate livestreams. I hope he does a show where he goes to open houses and fucks with the real estate agent/flipper
{continued) also the closest buildings are owned by some weird cult that never has attendees so it seems to be a property tax avoidance scheme as it seems people are living in those buildings in the back, like they aren't zoned for residential and trying to hide it. other than that its industrial neighbors its a really sketchy area lol. so no noise complaints, unless the cult residents create problems.
one thing I could do is "sublease" it as a brothel. it'd make a damn good brothel.
>there are no numbers, no property value assessment, no tax history. its been transfered from federal agency to federal agency to a local economic zone and literally only had 1 tenant for a short time in like 60 years
So, what little experience I've had with government buildings is that the government doesn't care about holding costs. Like at all. They'll let a building rot for decades and then once it may become useful to them, they'll just dump a bunch of cash to remediate and reno it and act like it's nothing (which it probably is, tbqh) Because of this, they may not be interested to sell and that's assuming that you can even get a hold of someone to talk to about it.
They tried to lease, they tried to sell for awhile, now they are trying to lease again. And they have it listed as a Rennovation/Re-Development Opportunity.. and "Real Estate Brokers Welcome!" Wonder what the fuck that means if its leased.
The only traditional commercial use for the building is because its waterfront, the only brief lease they had was with some tugboat operator.
This sits on the dead end of a waterway, and there is a neighboring successful maritime service operator currently using the entire waterway to park their fleet. If I buy the shore too I could possibly extort money out of them because it illegal for them to block the waterway... then I just lease my shore to them so their operations aren't fucked.
theres a shitty small AC unit or two on the roof behind the penthouse, way undersized for the whole building so it was probably just for whatever little office space the tugboat operator used. I'm sure some crackhead has taken the copper out of it already. There's sometimes evidence of a homeless sleeping under the front stairs in that arched first floor entryway (so cool -- I would put gates in those arches)
For an AC shortcut I was thinking of mounting those big wall AC units you see on construction site trailers on the back windows of the building, they are about the right size.
Fed? Good luck.
BUT, if you insist on pounding your head bloody against the .gov wall, the GSA is who you need to talk to. Maybe they'll talk to you, probably not.
Have a relative who was starting a first responder/EMT school, wanted to buy a property like that, couldn't get through to anyone who cared for 2 years, when he finally did, they said 'not interested in selling the land" and that was it.
I'd bet there's hundreds of thousands of acres, and thousands and thousands of buildings under the the control of the GSA, and they only sell a small fraction to the public.
That was my first thought and even ended deleting a reply saying something similar because I also didn't notice that he said the property had been transferred to a local economic zone, which are usually run by the local government, not the feds. Quite often these economic empowerment zones are very incompetent and corrupt. As long as it hasn't already been earmarked for one of their cronies, the economic zone likely will be very happy to get their hands on some easy cash for the property and require very little from OP beyond vague plans. They might even be able to help with any minor rezoning he needs to make the deal happen. OP, if it actually is in an empowerment zone, look into what kind of grants they might be able to get for you from the fed. They get to keep a share of the money for administration costs, so they'll be happy to help, but this also can come with strings attached, which themselves can go unreviewed if it makes life easier for the local employees.
next to a chemical plant is convenient. you can dissolve hookers there.
What do you mean by the location is shitty? It's in the ghetto or in the middle of nowhere?
It's a neat looking building and properly renovated would be spectacular but it also looks like a money pit. Renovations like these are a labor of love. Even if it was in a non-shitty area, you'd likely never get your investment back once you consider time and aggravation. Be sure this is where you want to be for the rest of your life and that you can make bringing this building back to life your own life goal.
Ask Nick tomorrow 7pm, he'll tell you what you need to know. It'll cost you $25 for a chat read though.
I want these guys to do a full fledged house renovation series. There has to be a bit in there somewhere if they hire the most cheesed out handymen they can find to do all the work.
i'd think it be pretty cool to own a building like that. it'll be very expensive to renovate though. upkeep will probably also be very expensive
i literally trespass and sit on the steps and feel the mass of the building and fantasize about owning it. there's no view lol and its in a bad neighborhood.
Looks neat just don't update with modern building materials and it will probably weather the next flood.
OP the only way this makes sense is if you get into the cocaine game. It would be perfect for being the final leg of smuggling cocaine via a delivery/garbage trawler business servicing cargo ships. Then launder money with a club in the building.
hmmmmmmmmmm
i love it
will be a lot of work but the structure is probably solid
the room layout will be hard you're going to struggle to feel like a home not a hotel
If you have to ask run the fuck away. How cool things are doesn't matter in the real world. You just like the dream, so dream.
Reality is it's shit and ". i would lease space to artists and maybe run a club" shows you have zero head for business of that sort. Since you seem to have already convinced yourself go right the fuck ahead.
Never have childish emotions.
wtf is the point in doing anything if you only strive for mediocrity?
You wouldn't understand.
i mean it's obviously a vanity project which would likely be a huge waste of money
it's never going to have a good layout for a home and the location makes it useless for any sort of commerical building
but if you managed to turn it into a home it would be sweet and my experience of these old public buildings is they are structurally solid which is always the number one major problem with any construction: bad foundations and integrity means it's a disaster nightmare project
having to put up new interior walls, new floors, and new pipes to redo the layout is a lot of work but none of it is major surgery it is just work
bro I would put a BDSM dungeon in there, lease it out to dominatrixes and their customers, and record shit and stalk the customer's identities and run a blackmail ring Epstein-style. corporate officer? okay now you give my friend's janitorial biz a contract which i get a cut of.
That thing looks like a fancy building but on PS2 graphics.
>100 year flood zone
I'll be honest, shit like this is the only type of flood zone I actually worry about. like, most flood zones are just meaningless BS, because they flag anything within 50ft of a mapped creek as flood zones, even when those "mapped creeks" are bone dry 98% of the year, take up 40% of the local area, and are physically incapable of receiving enough uphill rainfall to overflow the gutters. "flood zone" really doesn't mean a god damn thing in most inland states
At first glance, it really does look like a cool building, and mostly solid and sturdy. looks like it's got a lot of square footage and natural light, which are always great. It also has way too many fucking windows, which is going to be a bitch for heating/cooling.
I'd say get it inspected for black mold and all the other standard red-flags. Brick up all the ground floor windows, and half of the rest of the windows. Not sure how many of those windows are actually broken under that plywood, but it's probably non-zero. If it was a public/municipal building, that probably also means there is no showers, so you're definitely looking at a bathroom remodel. It's a good bet that this place also has no kitchen, so that's yet another remodel you might need.
there's a shower in the blueprint
oh, lol, I skimmed past the blueprints still no kitchen, and that's honestly not at all what I thought the interior lay out of this place would be, given the description in the OP. It really looks less like a public library, and a lot more like a 6 bed, 1.5 bath mega-house. I'd say, if you can buy this place for what you consider a fair price, and you know that you can afford to maintain the property, then you should get on on it before someone grabs it out from under you
54 windows to replace right off the bat!
Looks like it was a really cool little office back in the day
For some reason it looks to me like St. Louis.