Finding a home in the more affordable $200,000 range can be more difficult in Dallas in this market, and while — thankfully — good elementary schools and feeder patterns are much easier to find these days, finding the two in the same house can still be a reach sometimes. But this adorable Casa View Midcentury cottage is that unicorn.
Casa View is one of the view remaining enclaves in Dallas where you can still find move-in ready homes at a reasonable price point. And Realtor Jason Castro of Castro Property Group knows this — because he bought this home at 1821 Tisinger Ave. as a personal remodeling project.
“I think Casa View is kind of one of the last of those neighborhoods,” he said. “It’s just primed for a little reinvestment and a little redevelopment, and still have you know affordable housing in the city.”
“I think that’s the challenge — I do most my business in East Dallas, and when you start looking at Lakewood and other neighborhoods that are so overpriced, where do you go when you need a starter home?”
“Where do you go if you’re new in the workforce and want to find something around $200,000 to $300,000?” he said. “There’s really not a lot of options.”
This three-bedroom, two bath house has 1,320 square feet of living space, which may sound small on paper to some buyers, but Castro said that many of the older homes in Casa View are actually great examples of how you can make a smaller footprint seem much larger.
“In Casa View, you have smaller houses with decent square footage that you can reconfigure and kind of repurpose for the modern buyer,” he said. “And you can do it economically when there are smaller footprints, and you can easily refinish something and bring the aesthetics up to a modern appeal.”
And in the case of this rehab, Castro and his crew upgraded throughout, and included the curb appeal, too, taking a dated facade into 2019 with more modern paint choices and embellishments.
Inside, he made the most of an open floorplan that provides plenty of flexible living space that has benefited from new windows, new HVAC and ductwork, gorgeous flooring, custom cabinetry, quartz countertops, new fixtures, new appliances, and new plumbing.
A generous galley kitchen provides the best of both worlds — it’s open to the common areas, but also tucked back just enough to allow the entertaining-minded chef peace of mind that their cooking mess is somewhat hidden.
And — in a complete rarity for 1950s-era starter homes — the master boasts a large master en-suite and walk-in closets.
But home prices aren’t the only things that push this home to the top of any “must-see” list for homebuyers — there’s also the great location.
“It’s kind of an easy sell — you are five minutes down the road from White Rock Lake,” Castro said of the rapidly-appreciating neighborhood.
Also a perk of the location? Casa View Elementary, which not only met state standard but earned six out of six distinctions from the Texas Education Agency this year.
The phenomenal Dallas ISD school offers all kinds of great programs for its students, too, including orchestra, strings, coding classes, robotics, blended learning, and bilingual education.
Priced at $229,000, this home has been on the market for a week, and probably won’t last much longer. Want to see more of 1821 Tisinger Ave? Click here.
