What.
What.
What.
Oh and don’t bother cleaning up or anything.
It’s not like you’re asking strangers to spend nearly half a million dollars on this place or someth—oh, wait.
Listing: 5816 8th Ave NE, Seattle, WA 98105
Found by: Curbed Seattle
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Marty E.
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First, I’m tickled over the classic arrangement of the new TV sitting on the old dead cabinet TV.
Second, there is an odd juxtaposition of the clean room with the creepy doll laying on the plastic bed covers – and the whole rest of the house.
Franky, I wouldn’t pay half a mil for a house in such a dire need of renovation.
Creepy! Nothing like a room with two twin beds covered in plastic with old magazines and dolls strewn on them.
Also, is photo 9 supposed to be a phallic symbol on the bed?
That place is hideous. I live in the Portland/Seattle corridor, and I would be surprised if they could get half of what they’re asking for that piece of crap. They need to put a little time, effort, and money into fixing it up, much less cleaning it up for listing photos. Good grief.
Frodo beat me to the schizophrenic nature – this room’s a pit, but this one’s practically sanitized. But I suppose if messy folks are finally able to create one neat area, they might be justified in doing whatever is necessary to keep it that way.
The low-grade disturbing nature in every room of this older house doesn’t help its saleability one bit. The crypt-like garage, the overstuffed furniture and greatly over knick-knacked tiny living room, the popped wallpaper and exposed ductwork in the kitchen… where food is prepared… the fake paneling, and everywhere the incessant 70s decor. That doesn’t even begin to address the child-sized doll in the plastic bedroom, or the fact that in the larger listing photo the doll looks pregnant. (O_o)
But my “favorite” oddity here is the duo of the “electric” Last Supper up in the attic bedroom and the (literally) gnarly 3 legged table beneath it. Is that in-cord switch merely for a display light? Or is it for some psychedelic lava lamp effect? And does that altered state carry over to keep the table upright? It must be a viable table, but it sure doesn’t look that way in the pic.
The notation of 4 bedrooms with only 1 bathroom was already a concern, even before I saw that only 1770 of the square footage is *finished*.
I have to wonder if someone’s elderly parent has just passed on and the need to market the house quickly took precedence over taking time to clean up. I know from personal experience that trying go through decades of accumulated belongings precludes being able to make the place look presentable. Everything’s pulled out so one can sort it and putting it away would blow what’s already a monumental task. If there’s cross-country travel involved by those doing the sorting, cleaning up was a non-starter.
@Emerald63: Ahh… forgot about the “virtual tour”… Nothing more than the already disturbing photos set to zoom in and out and pan side to side. But there’s some really nice, relaxing loungey piano music and that’s almost worth bothering with the “tour.”
I had to stop at the paneling. I was literally getting nauseous just thinking about the smell of age and clutter that place no doubt exudes. Plus that dark paneling always reminds me of the house my FIL and his wife live in; both being heavy smokers of menthol cigarettes and dwelling in cave-like conditions where simply touching the walls will give you a near-lethal dose of nicotine and uuuuurrrrghh I really don’t feel good now…
Ok, my theory is that the two tidy bedrooms are upstairs, and reflect the way Grandma used to keep her house when she was more mobile. But then things downstairs started to get a little cluttered when she got older. Yes, there is something both charming and creepy about a house that’s so frozen in time, the sixties, so perfectly preserved. I keep telling myself that someday, the sixties will be “historic” and we will value preserving things from that period and lament their destruction. I’m not ready for that yet though.
Michelle’s likely right about the up-flights-of-stairs representing how things were kept when the old folks were more mobile. My reaction had been that the room with the plastic protectors over the bedspreads were meant to be guest rooms – always made up, just whip off the dust covers. Both explanations could, of course, be true. :)
@Michelle: I think you’re probably right, Michelle.
My folks lived in a ranch style house for the last 30 years of their lives, so I hadn’t really considered the stair challenge. They did have the laundry in the basement, but Mom’s home health care worker had done the wash for some years before her death. Besides, the basement was unfinished and had never been a regular living space.
However, my husband’s grandmother lived in her family’s 1879 stone farmhouse until just a couple years before her death, and she hadn’t bothered going up to either of the bedrooms for years before that. She slept on the sofa in the ground floor living room.
@Denita TwoDragons: I hear ya on both counts. Luckily, it’s my home that has the el cheapo dark paneling while it was my folks’ house that had the stench. They had some paneling, but nice, real wood stuff and it was only in one room.
For a couple of years after I finished cleaning out their place (which took forever), my own van reeked of transferred smoke smell from having hauled so much of their stuff to 1) donation sites, 2) my place, 3) storage for the nice things I can’t use currently, and 4) recycling centers. To this day, 7 years later, sometimes in the heat of summer I can still smell it when I first start up the van and the air comes on after it’s been parked in the sun. Nasty, pernicious, vile stuff. I’m happy to report that what Items I did bring home eventually lost the smell. :)
@Emerald63: A friend of mine told me that her neighbor had removed similar hopelessly foul odors from clothing, etc. with some sort of ozone generating device. I never found out what it was or who made it, but from her description the articles were put into some sort of bag-enclosure and the device run into it overnight.
I figure, with luck, I’ll never need to know… but I bet those companies that clean places up after fires, etc. have got ’em. ;)
@anodean: Thanks for the info. I may need it when things come out of storage. At this point though, the only thing I might possibly want to use such a device on is the van, and that ain’t gonna fit inside a bag, lol. :)
@Emerald63: Well, this is actually sort of hilarious. I finally got curious enough about what that magic device was that saved my friend’s good suit to go google – and the very first hit returned was how auto dealerships and detailers are now springing for industrial-sized ozone units because removing smoke, pet, etc. odors from cars is so profitable – whether as a service or to make used cars more salable.
Hard to say what they’d charge you – from the first blush, I’d guess up to $75 – but if you’ve got a friend or a friend of a friend in the business…
And my second try discovered portable industrial units that are apparently how hotels restore smogged no-smoking rooms – possibly by calling a service who brings them to “shock” whole rooms. I’m thinking, again, make inquiries among friends of friends, score an overnight visit at your storage unit, bust open all the boxes, and let ‘er rip…
:D
@anodean: Wow, thanks Anodean! That is definitely good info to know for when the time comes!
I’m thinking some of the smell (maybe most) may have dissipated already, because the items were all old enough and nice enough to merit indoor storage. (What seems odd is that this is actually cheaper than the outdoor, which is accessible 24/7 while the indoor is within certain hours only.) The unit has a very high ceiling, at least 12′, maybe 15-20′. The top couple of feet are steel openwork so the entire floor (or large portions thereof) share air space. A few things are covered, but a lot are exposed as they would be in a home.
At present we just don’t have room for the Danish mid-century dining table that normally seats 6 but can be enlarged to seat 12. The same goes for my dad’s roll top desk (size wise, not how many it seats, lol), a pump organ, an antique curved glass front china cabinet, and a kitchen china cabinet and table set.
One of these days, though, when we’re needed up at my husband’s family farm, we’ll get title to one of several rural houses they rent out and be able to do whatever we want, including ensuring a sound structure with reliable environmental controls and expanding, if need be. We can’t do any of that now, but when we can, it’ll be… old home week for all these wonderful items.
What nice things! I’m glad you’ve got them all
safely tucked away for the better tomorrow. We’ll all be rooting for you. :D
@anodean: Thank you, anodean! My parents had lovely taste and the professional success to afford them. The least I can do is take good care of them. :)