Swamplot

Today’s Sponsor of the Day is Unit 204 at the Parc V in Montrose. Thanks for sponsoring Swamplot!

Parc IV (at 3614 Montrose Blvd.) and Parc V (at 3600 Montrose Blvd.) are iconic Modern, concrete-frame residential towers designed by William R. Jenkins and Roy Gee, planted in the mid-1960s at the corner of Montrose and Kipling St. The University of St. Thomas, the Museum District, and some of Houston’s best restaurants are all within walking distance; it’s also an easy commute to downtown, Rice University, and The Medical Center.

This 1-bedroom, 1-bath unit on the second floor of the more northern of the 2 buildings faces north, across treetops and the grounds of the neighboring Annunciation Greek Orthodox Cathedral and toward Westheimer. (The balcony view is shown at top.) Inside, the brick walls and concrete columns have been exposed, raising the ceiling height and bringing a loft esthetic to the interior. The oak flooring has an ebony stain; the kitchen has concrete countertops, a glass tile backsplash, Metal Fusion flooring, and appliances from Bosch and Liebherr. The unit comes with a stacked washer and dryer as well.

To see more photos of this uniquely renovated unit, look through the photo gallery on the property website. This condominium is offered for sale by Michael Good of Michael Good Properties; see his webpage on HAR for contact details and more information.

Midcentury Modern or Turn-of-the-Century Whatever: Our readers will be interested to see it when it’s a Swamplot Sponsor of the Day.

Today our sponsor is Houston’s own Central Bank. Thank you for the continuing support of Swamplot!

Central Bank has 4 (central) Houston branches available to meet your business or personal needs: in Midtown, the Heights, West Houston, and Post Oak Place.

Central Bank believes that change is essential to its success; the company actively pursues the latest in service, technology, and products. Central Bank aims to know its customers personally and to be their primary business and personal financial resource. The bank’s staff values relationships and strives to be available when you need them.

To learn more about how Central Bank can meet your banking needs, please call any of the following Senior Vice Presidents: Kenny Beard, at 832.485.2376; Bonnie Purvis, at 832.485.2354; Gary Noble, at 832.485.2366; or Ryan Tillman, at 832.485.2307. You can also find out more on the bank’s website.

Reach Swamplot readers with our Sponsor of the Day program. Find out more here. 

Swamplot today is brought to you by the Downtown District — to let you know about its Clean and Safe program. Many thanks for supporting this site!

City government plays a crucial role in developing Downtown, but with so many areas to address no one administration can accomplish everything. That is why the Downtown District, an organization with strong ties to the business community and city leadership, is important: not only to look at the big picture but also to provide Downtown the continuity it needs to address a multitude of issues, including cleanliness and safety.

For 25 years, the Downtown District’s Downtown Street Teams have performed what many may see as simple tasks, such as picking up litter and trash, reporting needed repairs, and removing graffiti. But by taking care of those “little things,” they provide an environment that people take pride in and have now come to expect.

More recently, the Downtown Public Safety Guide Program was launched. The development of this program came through focus-group meetings with various downtown stakeholders, including representatives of residential, commercial, corporate, arts, and hospitality communities. The Guides focus on assisting pedestrians while identifying and monitoring on-street activities and working with property and business owners, Downtown Street Teams, HPD, social services, and others to help resolve issues and problems.

In 2016 the Downtown District’s combined teams had more than 115,000 civilian interactions. These interactions vary from helping someone find a parked car to giving directions to Discovery Green to helping a homeless person in need — and more. For the week of the Super Bowl alone, the team assisted more than 40,000 Houstonians and visitors!

Without the Clean and Safe program, no matter what you do to improve the Downtown area — building new buildings, increasing green space, adding or improving public art, infrastructure, or holding big events — there will be a reluctance for people to want to visit, stay, work, or live Downtown. Responding to the growing needs and demands of stakeholders, the Downtown District is committed to taking the management of Downtown’s pedestrian and streetscape environment to the next level.

How about taking your organization’s message to the next level? Swamplot’s Sponsor of the Day posts are a great marketing platform.

Today’s sponsor on Swamplot is Just Buyers Houston, a real estate brokerage that — you guessed it! — represents buyers only. Thanks for supporting this site!

Just Buyers Houston’s Judy Thompson writes: “I am a very analytical person (my husband says I should have been an investment banker, but in investment banking you don’t get the thrill of helping an accomplished professional person or couple find their first house). Helping people buy homes is a great source of satisfaction and I enjoy it a lot. I meet interesting people from all over the world and have pretty intense 6-week adventures in home buying with them. (If we’re lucky it’s all over in 6 weeks. Sometimes it’s not because there is such a shortage of things to buy.)”

The other day Judy was out on a walk admiring the brick bungalows in Winlow Place. Curious about how much they were selling for, she did a price analysis of bungalow sales in 3 Montrose Zip Codes and published it on her website. Here are the numbers: On average, they sell for about $345 per square foot, in 30 days, and were built in 1930. How many will be left in 10 years? You can find her analysis of 1-story Montrose-area brick bungalows here.

Offbeat analyses like these for buyers are a specialty at Just Buyers Houston — she does a lot of them. When the local real estate market was slow after the 2008 near-collapse of financial markets, she created an analysis identifying what percentage of sellers described themselves as “motivated” in their MLS listings. “That was fun for a while,” Judy says. “But then the market took off again and I stopped.”

If there’s a customized analysis you’d like to see, let Judy Thompson know. She’ll work on it.

If you’re working on getting your company’s name out there, here’s an easy help: Become a Swamplot sponsor.

What do we find in today’s sponsor post? The recently completed family home at 9763 Westview Dr. in Spring Branch, offered for sale by Nan and Company Properties. Thanks for supporting Swamplot!

If you enjoy entertaining in a spacious home, you’ll want to take a look at this 2,655-sq.-ft. residence. This 3-bedroom, 2-and-a-half-bathroom property has an open floor plan, tile floors, and plenty of natural light streaming through windows and illuminating the home’s clean lines.

The entry foyer has a 14-ft. ceiling; the living room features a stone-faced fireplace flanked by built-in shelving suitable for a sizable entertainment center.

The kitchen includes granite countertops, an island breakfast area, a gas range stove, and plenty of cabinets for storage. French doors off the foyer lead to the study, which comes with built-in storage and triple windows affording front-yard views. Bedrooms include hardwood floors and spacious walk-in closets; the master suite fronts a back patio deck.

That patio deck, lined with an iron railing, stretches along the entire back of the house. The listing includes renderings showing how a pool could fit in the back yard of the 10,010-sq.-ft. lot.

For a quick tour of this unique property, watch the video above (also available by clicking here). More information and more photos are available on the property website. If you’re interested in this home, please call Patricia Ruiz-Lessa of Nan and Company Properties at 713.714.6454 — or email her at patricia@nanproperties.com.

Unique homes shine in Swamplot’s Sponsor of the Day spotlight! Find out how to get your property featured.

Today’s sponsor: ASCOT, also known as the Alcohol Servers Counsel of Texas. Thanks for supporting Swamplot!

If you work in a restaurant, or in any kind of food-service or food-prep operation, you’re probably already familiar with state requirements for training in food-handling safety. And if you work in a bar or for an alcohol distributor, you probably already know why it’s so important that everyone who has anything to do with selling, dispensing, or delivering any kind of alcoholic beverage complete state-certified training in alcohol safety.

Since 1988, ASCOT has been licensed by the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission to provide TABC-certified alcohol-server training programs. That makes ASCOT one of the oldest and most established food and beverage certification programs in the country — as well as Texas’s longest-running provider of training in this important field. And ASCOT has been a preferred source for training in food handling in Houston since 2004.

If you’re responsible for making sure new employees are trained promptly and well in these particular areas, you can be sure they’re getting the exact program they need — in the most helpful format possible — by sending them to ASCOT. ASCOT offers its training courses both in a classroom setting and online, in both English and Spanish.

Use the discount code ASCOT on the alcoholservers.com website and the online alcohol-server training course works out to just $9.89 per class. The food-handling class costs just $7.00 — no discount code is needed.

ASCOT’s server-training program is certified by the TABC, and its food-handler program is ANSI Accredited as meeting the ASTM E2659-09 standard. For more details, or to sign up, head over to the ASCOT website — alcoholservers.com — or call 713.922.1223.

Supporting Swamplot could be a smart move for your business. Here’s more information about our Sponsor of the Day program.

Today on Swamplot our sponsor is Loam Agronomics — here to promote the company’s new CSA program for Houston. Thanks for the support!

Houston residents have already begun signing up for Loam Agronomics’ brand-new CSA program, which means they’ll start receiving weekly deliveries of fresh, locally grown vegetables in March! (CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture.) If you’ve been looking for a way to get a regular supply of fresh-from-the-local-farm produce for your household, or if you like the idea of eating food that hasn’t been shipped thousands of miles, but is picked at peak ripeness nearby and available to you in 48 hours or less, then this program is for you.

The first crops are growing now on a 40-acre portion of a 288-acre agricultural site the company has acquired in Richmond. And you can participate! When you become a member of the Loam Agronomics CSA, you’re purchasing a weekly “share” of vegetables from the company and supporting the production of local food in your community.

Loam Agronomics is a project of the same people behind Edible Earth Resources, the local gardening firm that’s been transforming some high-profile urban lots in Houston into attractive edible gardens. Loam Agronomics will serve much of the same community, but at a larger scale.

If you’ve got questions about the CSA program or the operation and standards of the farm, take a look at the answers to the FAQ posted on the brand-spanking-new Loam Agronomics website.

Loam Agronomics offers:

• Drop sites across Houston
• Pickups on Thursdays and Saturdays
• Signups available any time
• Cooking and storing tips
• Community events

. . . all for just $30 per week.

To join other families who’ve been signing up, all you need to do is select a convenient drop site; fill out a member information profile; and choose a payment plan (4-, 12-, 26-, and 52-week plans are available, some with discounted rates) — all of which you can do from this page on the Loam Agronomics website.

Don’t miss out on a great way to connect with a large audience of potential Houston customers. Become a Swamplot sponsor!

Sponsoring Swamplot today is Houston’s own Central Bank. Thank you for the continuing support!

Central Bank has 4 (central) Houston branches available to meet your business or personal needs: in Midtown, the Heights, West Houston, and Post Oak Place.

Central Bank believes that change is essential to its success; the company actively pursues the latest in service, technology, and products. Central Bank aims to know its customers personally and to be their primary business and personal financial resource. The bank’s staff values relationships and strives to be available when you need them.

To learn more about how Central Bank can meet your banking needs, please call any of the following Senior Vice Presidents: Kenny Beard, at 832.485.2376; Bonnie Purvis, at 832.485.2354; Gary Noble, at 832.485.2366; or Ryan Tillman, at 832.485.2307. You can also find out more on the bank’s website.

The secret to reaching Swamplot readers? Swamplot’s Sponsor of the Day program. Find out more here. 

Today on Swamplot our sponsor is personal coach Cricket Buchler. Thanks for supporting Swamplot, Cricket!

If you’re looking to make some changes in your life, or just searching for a creative spark for a jump-start, consider a 90-minute personal coaching session with coach Cricket Buchler. An experienced corporate trainer who has helped top executives, Hollywood celebrities, and employees in a range of industries address personal and professional development issues, Cricket also works one-on-one, guiding clients to explore and unlock possibilities and design plans to realize change, and coaching them through their journey toward an intentional life.

A coaching session can also be an inspiring gift for anyone who is looking to take the next step forward in life, work, or relationships, but feels a bit stuck as to what next steps might look like. You’ll find a sampling of testimonials from Cricket’s clients on her website, along with more information about coaching sessions.

Get it in gear, this year. Become a Swamplot Sponsor of the Day.