A few weeks ago, I wrote about seven one-bedroom Ritz Residences condos listed around the $1 million mark. But let’s say you need more space for your mil, what to do?
At $1.075 million you could just settle for one of those Ritz one-bedrooms at 1,375 square feet on the 15th floor. Or for $26,000 less, you could get a 20th-floor, 1,749-square-foot, two-bedroom at One Arts Plaza. Or for $50,000 less you could score a 21st-floor, 4,777-square-foot unit at The Mayfair on Turtle Creek. Or for $75,000 less you could get one of two 17th-floor, 5,126-square-foot penthouses at The Centrum.
So yes, between $1 million to $1.075 million you can score between 5,126 and 1,375 square feet. Each with high-floor views, just $75,000 (less) accounts for as much as 3,751 more square feet of living space.
Whaaaaa???
Of course it’s not that simple. The two smallest, most expensive ones are also the most “done” décor-wise – “move-in ready” for most as the patter goes. Both One Arts and the Ritz units are in newer, 2007-vintage buildings. They also command higher prices because of the buildings they are (high-rises are like neighborhoods, some just command higher prices – even mysteriously One Arts that faces a highway).
The whoppers at The Mayfair and The Centrum are older, built in 1998 and 1985 respectively. Both buildings command lower prices on average than One Arts or the Ritz. They’re also in pretty rough shape.
Centrum Math
The 5,126-square-foot Centrum unit is a shell. Hard to believe, but in the past 35 years, it’s never been occupied. Also unusual is that at three-stories, it’s more townhouse than penthouse – although it does boast over 2,000 additional square feet of terraces overlooking downtown.
But as every Realtor in town knows, it’s been listed as high as $2.6 million and has been on the market for roughly 2,586 days (this time). Clearly, October’s $450,000 price reduction to an even $1 million didn’t get checkbooks flapping.
Shells are harder and more costly than a renovation and without the apparatus of contractors in place at the Stoneleigh, a daunting task for even experienced renovators. And the end-of-day question – given the finish-out costs, could you get $2.5-ish million for the unit once it was finished? Given its similarly-sized (and finished-out) sister-penthouse apparently sold in May 2019 for $987,500, call me skeptical.
The Mayfair Maybe
The Mayfair’s unit 2101 is a 4,777-square-foot, two-bedroom with three full and one half bathrooms. This means that it was originally a three-bedroom unit (and could be again). Unlike The Centrum unit, it’s not a shell – but the décor is ghastly – tented and wallpapered ceilings, faux-finished walls, smoke mirrored walls, acres of 12×12 stone floors … and a fountain.
But like The Centrum, it has had a bizarre pricing history starting at $1.9 million in January 2020 after having been purchased just three months earlier in October 2019 for $1.614 million (after having dropped a million since it’s 2009 debut at $2.595 million). So at it’s current $1.025 million price, a bath will be taken by the sellers on this sale.
To most, this story should be told around a campfire, but wait.
Assessed by DCAD at $1.8 million, a prospective buyer can easily drop their tax bill in half with a $900,000 purchase price.
To get it up and running, gut the most egregious bits – the aforementioned tenting, texturing and papering plus removing the smoked glass, fountain and beige marble floors. Square-up the archways and install wood floors to match what’s in the bedrooms and paint everything white. Call that $250,000. I half wonder if just this “white boxing” would turn a quick profit?
At that point, where in a Dallas high-rise would you have a skyline-facing 4,777-square-foot high-floor condo for $1.15 million? With new, matching flooring and fresh paint? Nowhere. Outdated kitchen and bathrooms aren’t a Day One problem – everything still works, it’s just out of fashion (and a new coat of paint will minimize that).
But say you’re not shy on funds, you could thoughtfully gut/renovate the kitchen and bathrooms for another $400,000 to $500,000. Assuming no floorplan changes, you’re in for $1.65 million for 4,777 square feet on a high-floor overlooking downtown. Could you sell that for a profit? All day long.
Say you want to make some floorplan changes. Throw another $150,000 on the fire and you’re all-in and reconfigured for $1.8 million. I think you’re still in a very good financial position. Heck, I sold the freshly renovated Penthouse Plunge for $1.6m and it was only 2,770 square feet and just across Turtle Creek (not facing downtown).
The view is pretty stable too. Neither Turtle Creek Park nor Oak Lawn Park are going anywhere. The Renaissance condos and the Belmont retirement home aren’t going anywhere either. Sure, further in the distance things will change, but you won’t get boxed-in – and in rapidly growing Uptown and Oak Lawn, you can’t put a price on that.
The Competition
The headline of this column asks whether checkbook expedience was better than sweat equity. I’d say the answer was obvious, but you need one more piece of information. What can you buy for around $1.8 million?
The only thing close to this size and price is the two-story “penthouse” 705 at The Plaza I with 4,028 square feet and priced at $1.795 million. It’s very renovated, but faces into the ever-redeveloping Mansion Park, not downtown (and it’s 14 stories lower).
Otherwise, between $1.5 and $2 million there are 11 units sized between 1,900 and 2,600 square feet in a variety of buildings. Please don’t comment that there’s a 3,052-square-foot unit listed at The Warrington for $1.5 million. Warrington listings include balcony space in their square footage, leaving unit 16E with only 2,307 square feet of interior space (ya gotta cross-check Warrington listings in DCAD).
So again, the answer of whether checkbook beats sweat should still be obvious, except that most people will never renovate their homes. Most buyers settle for someone else’s taste instead of expressing their own. But if I needed 4,777 square feet, I’d choose The Mayfair unit hands down.
But I’m not most people. Are you?
