^ Damn, that sucks. I know how hard you worked on that. Meanwhile the neighborhood left that building to rot.

But you're the "bad guy", after all :rolleyes:

In defense of one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city, it can be tough to renovate 100 year old buildings when you don't have the financial means to do it.

Ok, then that means buildings like this should be torn down if we want to keep the neighborhood "affordable".

Is that what we should go for? Because I no longer understand what people want. Our cake and eat it too, I gather...

So fuck anyone who wants to invest the money to do it then right? The building in question was abandoned, had a stop work order, multiple code cases, and a demo order when. I acquired it. I was literally the only person who stepped up to take care of it. It would be a vacant lot if I didn't step up as the city was weeks away from razing it. Meanwhile stupid shits with paint decide to do hundreds of dollars worth of damage for fun as part of their lowlife hobby and then get pissed when I clean it up within 24 hours and spray racist bullshit on my building in response. And yes, the term yuppies is clearly racially charged here. Ironically only one of my units has white people living it it with the others having anything from Mexican young professionals to Venezuelan immigrants to african Americans. Just another case of ignorant assholes trying to block progress. I displaced no one and literally shoveled piles of dried human shit that homeless squatters left behind while cleaning it up. Literally 3' wide and 1' deep piles of shit. But as TUP said, I'm the bad guy because I'm being financially rewarded for taking that risk and putting that work in.

Ignorant, garbage, racists people of all races exist. Unfortunately, they are too ignorant to care about what improvements mean to buildings or their neighborhood. Their hate oversteps their own intelligence. Sad for humanity to see that or any other ignorant racist garbage throughout the city. Rush University was recently host to some hate writings on their property. If hospitals, who help and care for all people, can't escape hate sentiments toward certain races, what hope does the rest of Chicago have? Pathetic of the individuals who write it, and sad to see for those who understand the greater good in the world regardless of skin color, religion, or other differences between human beings of different backgrounds or ideals.

I was simply responding to your assumption that the neighborhood left the building to rot.

Did I say any of that? Or did I simply respond to his comment by saying that the neighborhood wasn't likely just leaving the building to rot due to the fact that the vast majority of Little Village residents do not have the financial means to renovate an aging building?

Yea that comment was pretty gauche by TUP, what else is new. People living below the poverty line are simply trying to put food on the table, high minded pursuits like architectural aesthetics are kind of not the priority of the day. They are no more to blame for it rotting than the Europeans that fled it in the first place. In fact, the current community if any thing have been the ones holding down the fort and keeping it vibrant despite limited means to do so. The threat of displacement is a real tangible fear for many people and yes it gets emotional when people hold you in contempt for simply existing as shown above. That doesn't make vandalism ok.

Anyway this is getting pretty OT.

You call THIS off-topic!?! 25 posts above butthole hamburger was being discussed! I love SSP...

The building was actually in great shape according to all the neighbors for years until a shithead gangbanger threw a molitov cocktail through the stairwell window because a member of a rival gang lived there. The owners then took the insurance money and embarked on a totally unpermitted illegal renovation where they lowered the basement floor and added a two story masonry addition literally inches from the L line in the alley and somehow expected not to get caught. They were trying to turn it into a 10 unit building by adding units in the basement and attic. They obviously got caught because the city is going to notice when you add a huge brick wall within reach of moving L trains.

So they got a stop work order and the recession hit and before you know it the bank (a local community bank, not evil Wall Street ) just leaves it totally unsecured and rotting. Homeless and gangbangers move in. That's when I first saw it listed on the MLS for $125k. I'm a stupid 24 year old at this point and actually went inside to check it out. It still had it's gorgeous original copper cornice and brand new aluminum frame windows at this point. Unfortunately I couldn't afford to pay $125k for an abandoned shell (or anything really lol) at that point so I forgot about it.

Then about a month later I saw the listing price drop to $25k and thought "well what's going on with that". I drove by again and the cornice and windows were gone. The cornice was ripped from the building and the windows were smashed for the aluminum frames. I figured it was just scrappers, but later found out it was the original owner who lost it to the bank who decided to come back and strip the property for whatever he could get. I ended up giving the bank an offer for $5,000 and they countered that they would quit claim it to me for free if I took it subject to all city actions and would pay my closing costs. So, being a green 24 year old, I went with it, took a massive risk, and, after 3.5 years of fighting with the city to get it out of court cases, get a zoning change (because they wouldn't let me keep the commercial component that had been then for 130 years since it went vacant for 5), and getting permits (took the city a year to issue them to me, you can see how helpful the city is!) I finally got construction started at the beginning of last year and finished it in fall.

Gee this poor neighborhood just having such a hard time maintaining buildings. I mean throwing Molotovs, doing illegal renovations, leaving it totally unsecured, and then coming back to strip whatever life the building had left in it just makes me feel soooo bad for this "poor neighborhood"... No, most urban deterioration is the result of a plethora of shitheads acting in chorus. No one gives a fuck and my experience here is living proof. I've single-handedly cleaned this whole corner of the Neighborhood up by just giving a shit. And frankly, most of little village is very well maintained, they might not have been gut rehabbed, but "too poor to maintain the building" isn't really a thing down there because the local population is very adept at keeping these things at least in habitable condition. Sure the historical features might suffer and there's always deferred maintenance, but at the end of the day they fix what must be fixed which is why the area lacks vacant lots in general.

Also, to be fair, most of the neighbors are great and absolutely support me. The little old pastor on the other side of the block, the big Mexican family next door (who saw me trying to cut the banks locks off the door the first day I owned it and brought me an extension cord and angle grinder to cut them despite barely being able to communicate with me), the families across the alley who called me every time they saw someone trying to mess with it. They all are great, they love me and I love them.

But there is a constant tide of shitheads crashing on areas like this, terrorizing the good people that live there, yet I'm the on who gets shit on as evil and all the malicious forces in the area get is protection from the landlord tenant ordinance and a light slap on the wrist if they ever get caught (which is rare).

Perhaps we need a thread about gentrification issues? It's a topic that should be discussed.

I used to teach in Little Village and Pilsen. In my experience, the vast majority of people in those two neighborhoods care tremendously for their communities and do as much as they can afford to in order to keep their houses safe for their children and looking nice.

Are there assholes that live in those neighborhoods and treat other people's property like garbage? Yep. But I find those people to be a small percentage of the overall population of those neighborhoods; a population that for the most part loves the community they live in.

I agree, all of my neighbors are very friendly and appreciative of what I'm doing. I'm buying four more properties on this block that have been left go in one way or another, but the neighbors are thirlled it's me because they know what happens when I get involved. I've had multiple neighbors express sympathy for the vandalism of my building and one of my neighbors actually has caught vandals about to strike before and driven them off by threatening to loose his pitbull on them.

My point is that these buildings typically don't just fall into disrepair, there is usually an asshole responsible and the neighbors recognize that. The reason I was able to acquire these latest properties is that some guy bought them, decided not to do any work on them for 10 years, and then died. Now the brokers didn't secure them and a homeless squatter set up shop and ran extension cords all over eventually starting the porches on fire. Again, not disrepair, but conscious irresponsible decisions by multiple people.

This thread needs to get back on topic and get some new pictures. I just clicked on the Wrigley Earth Cam link and the Zachary Hotel has most of the glass up (looks good) and a huge W flag draped down from the roof.
That webcam view looks so much better already compared to last year.

Someone please get some pictures of the area as the Game 3 crowds file in.

They have the first two floors of the retail, the 3rd and 4th of garage and the 5th and now 6th of apartments up on the Clark & Addison development. Only need the 7th and 8th of apartments and they'll top out.

That's on the Addison side, I believe on the Clark side they actually still have the entire section fronting the street to put up, they put up the back parking support structure first.

Hotel Zachary
 

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DLS9uh0XcAEOYhP.jpg:large
Photo credit: @WrigleyAerials

Any pics of the retail/commercial/apartment portion??

Hotel Zachary is turning out nice.

That's an important one, and it adds a nice and sharp urban edge to that corner.

A lot of work goes into restoration and renovation. After doing it to one house myself, I have a HUGE amount of respect to anyone who does it for multiple properties. Keep up the great work and hopefully no more dickheads try to make things tougher for you. :cheers:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DLd-vdDXkAA9xTx.jpg

Addison & Clark multi-use development

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DKrW8k6VwAApT8L.jpg

Southwest view

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DKrUt-XUIAA0AZa.jpg

Northwest view

h/t Wrigley Aerials