Subject: SLO County real estate madness
-----Original Message-----
From: Todd Gage
Sent: Wednesday, March 28, 2001 4:42 PM
To: carrie, marya, chester, jim
Subject: SLO County real estate madness

So a couple of months ago I was driving back up into SLO from SB, and I noticed the Old Schoolhouse just off 101 above Avila Beach Road.

Even some longtime residents miss this thing, tucked into a fold in the hills as it is. At freeway speeds, blink and you'll miss it, because it is right hard up against the 101.

It's a horribly dilapidated old singlebox house, with a charming though sagging porch and some gingerbread touches. Looked to my eye like early 1900s construction, or 20s revival.

Just looking from the outside I could guess that it's got massive dry rot and timber damage throughout, cancerous roof, you name it. People have to take better care of houses than they do in that kind of marine-layer microclimate.

Anyway, this thing has had people living in it -- I hope cheaply -- for a long time, as there have always been vehicles parked there and signs of life in the windows. It's also been for sale as long as I can recall, going back to at least the mid-90s. The realtor's sign was as beat up as the house itself :-)

I finally got curious on that trip and pulled out my phone and called the listing agent whose name was on the sign, to see what it was going for. Not that I have the spare cash to be buying a pied-a-terre in SLO (and moving it to more pleasant surroundings than next to a freeway), but just out of wonder.

Agent said, "Yes, the owner has that listed for $850K firm. He has turned down several offers below that."

Damn! I replied as pleasantly as I could that I knew that America's crack smoking epidemic was widespread, but I hadn't known it was into the SLO landowning class to that extent.

Eight fifty for a trashed white elephant house needing -at least- 350K of urgent repair, where a not very strong frisbee toss from the front yard will bonk cars in 80MPH freeway traffic?

"Yeah, well, that's what they want for it. Historic structure and all that." (This was reportedly one of the earliest "official" buildings in SLO, dating from the 1890s.) "And it has a big lot."

Er, yeah, OK. Thanks. Bye.

So this weekend I was in Linnea's, and there was a flyer up behind the counter which said, "THE SCHOOLHOUSE HAS BEEN SOLD. Curious as to the squalor in which your co-workers live? Come help us clean up and move out!"

No details past that. But I did drive by and it appears to be the site of activity. Amazing. Someone really was dumb enough to step up and spend the money. It's possible that the owners backed down on the price. Maybe.

Or just another symptom of madness. Amusing, though, if they did pay full list. I enjoy watching people with more money than brains as they have the balance equalized for them.