BLIND ITEM: “POPULAR PUB INSIDE LOOP” FOR SALE — GUESS WHICH Your clues: “This very popular pub boasts great reviews, has been in business for 16 years and is a big hit with the neighborhood crowd as a place for local residents to gather and enjoy adult beverages in a relaxing atmosphere. It is one of the very few places in Houston that has a bocce court (lawn bowling). . . . The median age of their clientele is probably 30-35 and they enjoy playing bocce in their spacious beer garden, watching the world go by from their sidewalk [cafe], relaxing indoors in air conditioned comfort, watching their favorite sports on any of their indoor / outdoor televisions, playing a game of darts, enjoying their favorite music from the internet jukebox or taking advantage of the free Wi/Fi. They are well known for their great beer/wine selection and friendly service.” [BizBuySell, via Twitter user ucalledthewolf]
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$200k for $83k a year take home? Not in this day and age! Nobody pays for goodwill anymore (even banks don’t count it as an asset). They’d be lucky to get $80k to $100k.
Should that be ‘…takes the odd big hit from the neighborhood crowd’?
If this is Hans’ (I don’t know), someone please buy it so the 2520 Robin Hood Projectile-launching facility cannot claim their sicko “victory”.
This is Hans’. The property description is taken straight from the website.
So it’s Hans or Zimm’s Little Deck, right? I know the Patrenellas aren’t selling… any other bocce courts? If it is Hans, I think a strip club should go in.
Somebody please buy it and put in a heavy metal club, preferably speed metal.
Better yet, buy it and turn it into a biker bar. I’m sure the neighbors would prefer that.
What?
If it is indeed Hans’ then no sane business owner will buy it, at the end of the day the fight against Robin Hood cannot be won. RH residents will fight tooth and nail against the transfer of liquor license, any approval in likely remodeling permits, and will certainly add any new owner to the civil lawsuits. Nobody wants that headache.
Spoonman – check the archives.
Commonsense – nowhere near as hard as you try and make it sound…also, ludicrous that new unaffiliated owners would be added to a pre-existing civil suit – doomed to fail.
Transfer liquor license from facility that has one in good standing – if buyer is not felon, etc. – no problem.
I’d love to see your pals tortiously interfere with a legitimate sale between two qualified parties, with a liquor license up-to-date and in good standing for a facility that preexists Robin’s Hoods in the neighborhood.
Time for another HOA increase for the war chest, dummies! …and you’ll lose.
Hopefully some Han’s regular will come here and fill in the blanks. After following all the past happenings here, I’d sure hate to think that Han’s owner just caved.
Bummer for sure.
Udunno, perhaps you are not fully versed in the real life practice of our civil judicial system.
It is very common to add new parties, unaffiliated parties and anyone you may think has a pinky in a deal you are suing about.
Filing a lawsuit is a right and never counts as torturous interference (win or lose). At best it’ll be dismissed with each party covering their own attorney’s costs.
And on the larger scale all RH owners have to do is file and follow up for a few steps and it’ll cost the new owner $50k just to defend himself. So, winning for RH is not as paramount as to cause someone to incur cost and deter them from opening.
This type of shi*t happens all the time in Houston and judges and juries 99% of the time make each party pay their own attorney’s fees.
I should also point out I have no personal interest in what happens there but I’m generally for the side of the home owner’s vs. a nuisance establishment.
P.S. There’s also a lawsuit on record against the place on the other side of RH for similar reasons.
Rumor is that the civil suit AGAINST the condos was settled out of court recently.
According to county records as of today, the lawsuit was originally filed by Hudson Lounge and then Robinhood counterclaimed, winning a restraining order against Hudson to stop playing any music outdoors. It also appears to be set for a hearing later this month. There’s also a lot of juicy details there but yall can read that on your own.
If I had to pick one of either Hans’ or the condos as a nuisance establishment, I’d pick the one who are dropping potentially lethal projectiles off of high buildings.
According the the same records, the Robinhood/Hans lawsuit has reached an agreement where they’re not allowed to have any contacts with each other, Robinhood can’t shine their security lights and Hans is expressly forbidden from breaking COH noise ordinance and is limited to only 2 events per month which require a prior permit. It also seems a couple of the owners are trying to exclude themselves from the settlement to keep the fight going. Judging by the number of filing on that case the legal bill must be well over $100k… perhaps as high as the full asking price for the business of $200k.
commonsense – msg me on twitter @ucalledthewolf. would like to ask more about the noise ordinance, etc. as a a bar/restaurant operator, concept must compliment neighborhood, not fight it. thx.
Commonsense-
Good to see you dropped your liquor license argument- a loser, as I said.
Also, never said new parties COULD NOT be added – misquote – I said the effort to “stick them” was doomed to fail.
Clearly, seller will dispense with preexisting legal fees as a part of the sale…simple negotiation.
Paying any post-purchase legal fees would not approach your apocalyptic assertions.
As to your insult, I have been in a multi-year legal battle where the opposition’s only hope was the legal fee-drag out strategy. I paid my $66K gladly, they gave up and my business thrived. Those fees are a distant memory.
Perhaps, in fact I am ACUTELY “versed in the real-life practice of our civil judicial system”. On the other hand, I believe that you are naive about the collective net worth of partnerships who frequently buy bars….even inexpensive one’s like Hans’.
There’s nothing you raised that would prevent a well-heeled group or individual from buying and running Hans’…except perhaps the potentially homicidal late-arrivals next door…and their projectiles.
I say Robinhood already succeeded… Hans has been reduced to 2 events per month (with a prior permit from COH at that), $5000 automatic fine for any violation of the City of Houston noise ordinance and not even allowed to drive down the street past the highrise. This surely reduces future value to any purchaser. Add 3 years of legal fees into the equation, this is surely the reason they are selling now.
“From Stating the Obvious: So it’s Hans or Zimm’s Little Deck”
———
Zimm’s Little Deck is very new. “Hints” are that it’s 16 year old bar.
So the winner is … the party with the deepest pockets. Gotta love our justice system at work.
Commonsense: You are in every other case loudly in favor of the unfettered rights of the property owner. Therefore in this scenario, I would expect you to say that the Hans owners are free to use their property for any legal purpose they choose, and if the neighbors don’t like it they are free to buy the bar and use the property how they see fit. But instead you always favor the condo-owners being able to restrict the bar’s use of its own property. Do your views on property rights only extend to establishments you personally approve of? Would you say the same thing if Hans was owned by Weingarten?
Some facts:
1) It’s a relatively laid-back pub, not a rowdy young clientele bar.
2) Han’s has been in business in that location for well over a decade.
3) RH condos were built years after the bar was open.
4) Residents knew the bar was there when they purchased their condo.
According to some people’s logic on here, if you buy a new house, you’re allowed to put any existing business near you out of business.
may we continue to welcome our petulant suburban empty-nesters and entitled young professionals and hope that they continue to embrace the long-standing businesses that have helped shape the inner-loop into what it was up until the recent housing boom. i for one look forward to the continued income segregation of the inner-loop and can only hope it lives up to all the fruitful bounties that the woodlands and sugarland have reaped for their fair citizens.
Tacotruck, I consider the type of establishment in my decision on which side to take. In this particular case it’s an establishment with no productive purpose which violates noise ordinances on regular basis. If it was a business of merit, even an oil refinery, I’d probably side with the business.
commonsense, the fact that you consider a bar as a business “with no productive purpose” tells me pretty much all I need to know. Some of the greatest ideas in the history of mankind have been formulated in bars. I’m still waiting for one to hit me there but in the meantime I find being able to chat with my friends and neighbors to be an activity of significant merit.
I am going to put together a partnership of tenacious, beer-loving attorneys and buy it.
I’m serious.
and by noise ordinances i assume you mean the brand new updated ordinances to account for residential towers built immediately adjacent to busy thoroughfares and on top of 16-yr old bars.
Commonsense: In other words, you and you alone are the arbiter of which property owners are allowed to use their property free of interference. You don’t care for bars, so bars don’t qualify. If you didn’t care for coffee, would you condone flinging rotting meat at starbucks? And to where do ordinary property-owners submit their requests for your approval? Until your last comment, I had always appreciated the consistency of your property-rights arguments, even if I didn’t always agree with them, and felt they kept the commenters here honest. Now I realize you consider some property-owners more equal than others.
@anon. With you on that.Not kidding.
Tacotruck, I am consistently FOR property rights, in this case I’m for the right of residents to have “peaceful enjoyment” of their property.
Hans has the right to do what they want with their property, except break laws, which they did consistently and deliberately.
@anon and @sally01,
Ironically, a few years ago the bar was owned by three co-owners, two of whom are lawyers.
@GoogleMaster
I posted a comment six months ago about the owner of Hudson.He videotaped his neighbor keying his car, and it made the national news. (NYT, WSJ, etc.)This business owner has a lengthy criminal record, (obtained license under someone else’s name.)You never know who your neighbors are….http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6949561.html
This is a shame, it was nice knowing that Han’s was fighting the good fight.
I think Commonsense was Carrie Nation in another life. We all know that oil refineries are able to operate in complete silence.
@sally01,
Try Hans’ own About page and then cross-reference the other two names with the State of Texas bar directory (under “Find a Lawyer”).
My guess is that the two wisely sold out their shares before the condo fight got heated up.
Ummmmmmm?
http://www.ultimateheights.com/stories/244575-heights-resident-accused-of-promoting-fighting-words-against-condo-residents
Ha, this entire thread verbatim made it into the lawsuit as evidence (including everyone’s nicks) … I feel almost famous :)
Nuisance lawsuit much?
There is a topic on HAIF that includes the lawsuit and exhibitA.
Per exhibitA, the Swamplot thread goes to post 36, only posts 35 and 36 included in exhibit A are not the same as posts 35 & 36 here. It’s those posts 35 & 36 in the exhibit that made the condo residents “fear” for their lives.
Frankly, I’m wondering if the condo owners might have somehow stolen a swampie’s ID and posted the inflaming comments themselves.
Hey, my comment was deleted and a mysterious threat appeared in its place just long enough for a screenshot, THEN (cue Woody Woodpecker laugh music) it magically REAPPEARED! I was going to say – if the thought of Carrie Nation makes people fear for their lives, I know what I’m gonna be this Halloween!!!
Seriously, is anyone going to fall for this? Can two comments with the same time signature of 10:11 PM (that weren’t there anytime I checked back) really post at once?
I thought the whole thing was a bit dubious. I’ve read all of the threads related to this story and have never seen threats of the type described in the lawsuit. I would suspect someone in the condos has mastered basic html and put the threats in themselves on a local copy of the page.
Right Hellsing, I noted those identical times too.
Surely Gus is on top of this and when all is over and done with, we’ll probably get an update. I just can’t imagine that any court would give credence to any so called threats made here.
And I wonder where matt mystery is. I’m sure he’d have a thing or two to say about exhibitA!!
Having read the exhibit on HAIF I’m even more certain that those comments were never there. I remember you comment going up Hellsing and I’m very sure I would have noticed something like those other two.
I saw those two inflamatory comments for brief period of time but Gus must have been quick on the trigger to delete them. Plus if you read those comments you can tell they did not sound genuine and more of a joke or an obvious fake by someone else.
Wow – and all these fearful condo dwellers just happened to be on that comment page on a Monday night in time to see those two postings for the brief time they were up? If they would turn their mysterious powers to picking lottery numbers, they could buy the Bier Haus themselves.
While I have rarely agreed with Matt Mystery’s comments, i have noticed that he is generally articulate and spells things correctly.
I would have assumed the legal issues with the bar owners would be enough to keep the condo owners busy. going after swamplot seems like a stretch.
Good luck Gus! give us some updates when you can.
#45 commonsense, if you saw the posts in question, then they were deleted quickly, that tells me that whoever posted them must have immediately taken the screen shot so as to have it for exhibit A. Totally bogus from the git go.
And I agree with Ash, regular poster here named matt mystery is more articulate than the person who posted on the offending “exhibit A”.