Heights Luxury Homes -Million Dollars Plus
How Many Million Dollar Homes are Sold in Heights?
I’ve written about high-end Heights homes before, but now they are more common. 5 years ago you would have had a hard time finding such a home in the Heights. There might be one for sale, but typically it was very old, very large, and was on a huge lot. Today, there are a dozen or more on the market, plus a few more in Garden Oaks, Oak Forest and Timbergrove Manor. This link is a Current MLS Search of Million Dollar Homes in the Heights and nearby.
The two homes shown below are two of my listings. 1845 Harvard St. is a renovation of a 1914 Mediterranean style home. It is $1.245M for 4083 SF 3/3.5/2 and is nearing completion.
1843 Harvard St. is also in a historic district, but is new construction. It is $1.336 M for 4268 SF 4/3.5/2. Both of these homes are on 6600 SF lots. January Note: This home sold in December. The owners love the house and the ability to walk to restaurants nearby.
Sales of Million Dollar Homes
| Year | Million Dollar+ Homes Number of Sales/Year | Avg. Price/SF | Ratio of List $ To Sales $ |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | 3 | $271/SF | 0.91 |
| 2012 | 8 | $253/SF | 0.93 |
| 2013 | 19 | $285/SF | 0.96 |
| YTD 2014 (04/30/14) | 8 | $331/SF | 0.99 |
1843 Harvard. New Construction in Heights Historic District
Kitchen of 1843 Harvard
1845 Harvard A Restoration of 1914 Mediterranean
1845 Harvard Master Bath
The table above shows the trend of high-end home slaes in the Heights: In 2011 only 3 homes sold in that rarified range; In 2014 they are selling at 1-2/month and coming on the market continually.
The reason for this trend is complex of course, but it can be boiled down to the popularity of the Heights. People used to come here for the quaint, funky, eclectic homes found here. It wasn’t a prestige neighborhood. The prestige people bought in West U.
The Heights was a hodgepodge of good, bad and ugly. There were core “good” streets that people preferred (i.e Harvard, Arlington, Cortland, etc.), but a lot that were still shaky. As I have said before, Bellaire people (from the land of uniform mini-mansions) would never move here.
There weren’t any restaurants here either. To eat, you went to Montrose, or out hiway 290.
Summary: In the past people moved to the Heights for its charm and funkiness. Well, not anymore…The Heights is now a premier neighborhood.
I do open houses most Sundays and have found that half the people looking for Heights real estate are oil and gas people. They might work in the Energy Corridor, or planning to work in the Woodlands at Exxon-Mobil. They want the activities of inside the loop, and the Heights is a great central location. A thirty minute drive to work against traffic is not bad.
People are pouncing on Heights homes when they come on the market. This in turn makes builders pouncing on lots to build on. If a builder pays $350K or more for a lot, he can’t build a cheap home. He can put up a single house at $1.3M or so, or two homes at ~$700K.
Either way, the Heights is becoming a luxury market.
For more information on the Heights/Greater Heights please see:
- My page on the Heights/Greater Heights, the one source for understanding the Heights
- Heights Historic Districts. Maps, locations, descriptions of 7 Heights historic districts
- Interactive Heights Map See how this jigsaw puzzle of neighborhoods fit together
Tags: Houston Heights
