06/10/14 8:30am

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Photo of the Julia Ideson Building at 500 McKinney Ave.: Steve Oprea via Swamplot Flickr Pool

Headlines
06/09/14 5:00pm

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The floor plan may qualify as “open,” but rooms take shape nonetheless (top) in a compact 1960 Holly Park home that was listed in late May with a $375,000 asking price. The updated property sits mid-block on a street in the middle of its neighborhood, which is located near Timbergrove Manor, south of W. 18th St. near the West Loop feeder road’s transition into the North Loop.

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Tidy and Tiny
06/09/14 3:00pm

Future and Past Home of Live Sports Bar, 405 Main St., Downtown Houston

Be careful not to confuse these life-and-death downtown bar stories: As we learned this morning, the Live! at Bayou Place bars are now dead. But the Live Sports Bar (no exclamation point!), which died back in 2009 at 405 Main St. is about to be resurrected. But in name and address only: A Live Sports Bar — same name, but with different owners — will be opening up in a slightly smaller version of the original space (4,000 sq. ft., marked down from 6,140) across from the Preston St. light-rail stop sometime in the next few months, once the buildout is complete. A Swamplot reader captured the above photo showing the new head-turning banner now posted out front.

Photo: Swamplot inbox

Same Name, Same Spot, Different Owners
06/09/14 12:45pm

1515-1705 West Gray St., Montrose, Houston

The team at Braun Enterprises has bought up a series of properties wedged between the Metropolitan Multi-Services Center on West Gray St. and the electrical substation at the corner of Peden St. and Dunlavy, including the 2 retail buildings pictured above. Braun bought up a total of 5 separate parcels in 4 transactions this year, including the offices of Miner-Dederick Construction at 1532 Peden, and retail spaces at 1515, 1705, and 1707 West Gray. That’s a bit shy of an acre in total. Real Estate Bisnow’s Catie Dixon reports Braun is considering selling, leasing, redeveloping, or building something for a future tenant on the property. Here’s a rendering from Braun showing what a renovation of might look like:

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Peden Transformers
06/09/14 11:00am

Live at Bayou Place, 534 Texas Ave., Downtown Houston

The 4-bar complex upstairs in downtown’s Bayou Place known collectively as Live! at Bayou Place shut down at the end of last month. “Cowboy bar” PBR, Lucie’s Liquors, Shark Bar, and Chapel Spirits had replaced Slick Willie’s Pool Hall and Rocbar in 2011, around the same time the Sundance Cinemas took over the Angelika Film Center spot downstairs in the same building. (Previous upstairs nightspots had included BAR Houston and Whiskey Creek.) The 4 bars took up 18,000 sq. ft. of space, and required a single admission for entry.

A reader notes that Sundance, The Blue Fish, the Bayou Music Center, the Wine Cellar, Hard Rock Cafe, and Italian restaurant Little Napoli are still open in the same building, a 130,000-sq.-ft. entertainment complex carved out of the former Albert Thomas Convention Center almost 17 years ago.

Photo: Shea Serrano

Downtown Shutdowns
06/09/14 8:30am

i-45 and allen parkway installation

Photo of I-45 at Allen Pwky.: Russell Hancock via Swamplot Flickr Pool

Headlines
06/06/14 1:30pm

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It’s a bit of a prickly walk past the cacti to the low-key entry of a palm-shaded 1948 Art Moderne-ish contemporary home with pool that’s available for lease in Braeswood for $4,800 per month. The residential street is located a block south of W. Holcombe Blvd. on a block west of Greenbriar Dr. that’s chock full of housing styles ranging from postwar to more recently built townhomian.

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Lease Me
06/06/14 12:15pm

The mysterious promoter of a proposed trio of condo towers planned for undisclosed Houston locations has posted a second video talking up the vague project — and dissing other condo developers almost every step of the way. But unlike the original video, which aims to get prospective buyers to sign up for a mailing list by flashing images of condos in other cities and counting off extensive amenities like “a fleet of cars” and an indoor pet park, this new marketing effort is aimed at Realtors.

But did someone complain that promising to be able to build a 36-story highrise condo tower (or 3) in just 12 months sounds kinda unrealistic? Because the new video (embedded above) doubles down on that original claim, taking up a good quarter of the almost-5-minute monologue to explain how it’s totally doable (the “William’s Tower” and some unidentified building in China are offered as examples) — while pointing out how other Houston developers are taking so much longer with their projects. Students of marketing psychology (or of the psychology of marketers) will clearly want to preserve these videos — and the entire sales-before-construction effort — for future study.

Video: Elevated Living

And the Other Guys Suck
06/06/14 11:00am

8008 Colgate St., Glenbrook Valley, Houston

8008 Colgate St., Glenbrook Valley, HoustonIt isn’t listed on MLS, but this 2-story mod from 1963 is now for sale. You can see it this weekend: The house at 8008 Colgate St. in Glenbrook Valley is one of 3 featured properties in this weekend’s “Mod of the Month” open house hosted by Houston Mod (along with 2 Meadowcreek Village homes that were featured on Swamplot recently). This one is the product of a to-the-studs renovation and expansion completed last year.

What a journey it’s been: “A long term owner had let the house go,” reports agent Robert Searcy, who’s representing the seller. “The flat roof had leaked, water and mold damage plus animals that had been allowed to defecate in the house, I think maybe even some that died in the house and were never removed. The owner’s cars had been sitting in the garage for decades, on flats, fake Christmas trees and junk piled on them, (a Rolls Royce and a Jaguar sedan, both had been bought new originally).”

Here are a few before-and-after views to give a picture:

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Double Decker Redo
06/06/14 8:30am

Southwest Fwy., Greenway Plaza, Houston

Photo of Southwest Fwy.: Russell Hancock via Swamplot Flickr Pool

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