A 19th-Century Old Town home sold for just under $5.6 million as a local builder’s “labor of love” in a luxury submarket marked by teardowns.
The house, at 1823 North Lincoln Park West, is over 140 years old. Custom homebuilder Dee Thompson of Urbane Home, who is also a broker with @properties Christie’s International Real Estate, restored the 6,400-square-foot property and sold it for about $867 per square foot in a deal that closed this week.
The 6,000-square-foot main house has five bedrooms and five-and-a-half bathrooms, and there is a one-bedroom, one-bath 400-square-foot carriage house, according to the listing.
Thompson bought the home in April of last year for under $2 million and took out a construction loan for under $3 million shortly after, according to property records.
Thompson said she knew she wouldn’t make as much profit on a renovation as she could have with a teardown, but she came away with “healthy” profit margins.
“I will never want to tear down a house, if the bones of it are good, especially in Old Town,” said Thompson, who has lived in the neighborhood for 15 years. “If you look at most of these homes that have been here for a long time, they are really beautiful.”
The teardown route is not her first choice, even though it is less complicated, she said.
“There has to be a pretty big decision that the structural engineer makes to say it’s just not even worth saving,” Thompson said. “When we get to that point, we really focus on making sure that it still looks as if it was there all along and was meant to be in Old Town.”
That attitude is in contrast with many builders in Old Town and Lincoln Park who compete for off-market deals and often opt for teardowns to build modern, minimalist construction as the market gets tighter in two of Chicago’s hottest neighborhoods.
Thompson declined to say who bought the house, and the buyer has yet to be identified in public records. She is staying on to help the buyer add a few customizations, including a pet station off the house’s mud room.
Thompson represented herself in the sale, along with Dione Craft, also of @properties. Bari Mill, a Coldwell Banker Realty agent with the Dawn McKenna Group, represented the buyer. Mill and McKenna declined to comment.
The home was the priciest “spec” project Thompson has ever done, as she typically prices her projects in the $3 million to $4.5 million range, she said.
“Everything turned out beautifully, but I don’t know if I would continue to do that [price point],” she said. “From a risk perspective, there’s limited buyers in that pool,” particularly given that many luxury buyers are looking for modern mansions that have more direct comparables.
Thompson has renovated several homes for her own residences: a home in Lakeview in 2005, a Lincoln Park condo in 2008 and an Old Town home in 2010.
She and her husband built another home on Old Town’s North Park Avenue 10 years ago, where they still live. During that project, her husband suggested she put her design and project management skills to use on other people’s homes, and since then, she has had a hand in shaping 14 homes on her block of North Park Avenue in Old Town, she said.
Thompson’s “labor of love” included speaking with neighbors to learn the history of the home.
Prominent Chicago jeweler and diamond-setter Theodore Shrader owned it in the late 19th Century. He ran a business at 34 Washington Street downtown. Shrader’s first business, working as a stone engraver at Lake and Clark, was destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.
Old Town gets its name for being one of the earliest areas of Chicago to be inhabited by immigrants to the city, of which Shrader was one. He immigrated from Germany with his parents in 1856, when he was 7 years old, Thompson said.
Honoring the history of 1823 North Lincoln Park West was all about taking the time to preserve small details, she said, like a hidden doorbell on the side of the house that Shrader may have used for jewelry drop-offs.
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