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School construction program spends $490K for three parcels: The Ann Arbor Student Building Industry Program replenished its stock of land with purchases last month of two lots in Lombardo’s Trailwoods subdivision and an empty lot on Pratt Rd. that belonged to longtime local Roslyn Freed who recently died at ninety-two. Mark Valchine, who manages the program in which thirty-two high school students build a house every school year, tells the Observer that the 2024–25 crew will build on the last parcel remaining from a large purchase in 2012 in the Kirkway subdivision off Jackson Rd.
Related: Strong Foundations
A head-spinning turnaround: Less than two years ago, Ann Arbor investor Byron Foster’s G.E.C.K.O. Reno LLC bought a modest ranch home on .34 acres at 1504 Long Shore Dr. for $395,000. Last month, they sold its replacement, a 5-bedroom, 3-bath two-story contemporary with a garage-roof terrace overlooking the Huron River, for $1.45 million. It’s the company’s seventh rebuild since 2020, according to its website, and its next project is already underway at 2930 Hickory Ln., which it bought for $755,000 in September 2023.
First three Veridian at County Farm units sold: The 4-bedroom, 4-bath, 2,105-square-foot townhouses in the eco-friendly, all-electric community went for an average of just above $895,000. That leaves ninety-six market-rate units to go in Thrive Collaborative’s highly anticipated mixed-income development off Platt north of Huron Pkwy. Avalon Housing is building the Grove at Veridian, a fifty-unit affordable housing apartment complex, next door.
Related: Veridian At Last
This Old House of the Month: Condos rarely get much respect as historic or architectural gems, but the $860,000 sale of 505 Detroit St. #2, a 2-bed, 2-bath, 1,560-square-foot unit, spotlights the city’s very first apartment building, the Stofflet Block. It’s one of eight two-story units in an imposing red-brick structure with symmetrical end towers built in 1900 by news and book dealer Francis Stofflet, whose name is carved in stone at the top. It went condo in the 1980s, and units have rapidly appreciated; 501 Detroit #1 went for $389,000 in 2012. More recently, 501 Detroit #2 sold for $750,000 in 2021.
