09/12/14 1:45pm

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The frontrunner on a split lot with a shared driveway, this 2002 contemporary in the Westhaven Estates area captures space for a splash zone courtyard. Sculpted landscaping and decorative panels soften the curbside appearance of the sturdy wall erected near the sidewalk on Inwood Dr., south of San Felipe Rd. between Nantucket and Potomac drives. The front property’s relisting by a new agent this week set a $1.139 million asking price. Back in February, a previous market appearance had begun with a $1.195 million price tag. A reduction in April, to $1.145 million, briefly snagged a contract in June before the property took off for the summer.

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Front and Center
07/09/14 5:00pm

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Over in the gated community of Indian Trail, this townhome-like pad has patios-a-plenty. Builder Ed McMahon constructed the property for his mama back in 1974, or so the listing posted last week notes. Renovated in 2007, the home with recessed entry now sports a $1.75 million asking price. Its flat-topped front-loader garage ivies up a garden-lined walkway to form the first of several outdoor vignettes.

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Wall Street
07/08/14 4:00pm

Former Denny's Classic Diner, 6415 Richmond Ave., Houston

Former Denny's Classic Diner, 6415 Richmond Ave., Houston“By the time I got back from lunch it was completely demolished,” writes reader Robert Vercher of the long-shuttered former Denny’s Classic Diner at 6415 Richmond Ave., just east of Hillcroft. So he sends us the photo at top, to show us the current status of the chain-restaurant location that once looked so shiny and newish-old (as seen in the older photo at left). Still hungry for a late Grand Slamwich? Try the Denny’s that’s still open, a few blocks west at 8999 Richmond Ave.

Photos: Robert Vercher (demolition); LoopNet (diner)

City-Fried Steak
06/02/14 4:30pm

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A 1976 home by architect Lucian Hood in the Indian Trails neighborhood north of Tanglewood displays different approaches to detail inside and out. Tall windows, extensive parquet flooring, and columns add drama to the finishes inside (top). The outside? Not so much (above). The corner lot property, at Chimney Rock Rd. north of Woodway Dr., has a front-filling driveway that curves around semi-walled landscaping. Listed last week, it has a $1.4 million asking price. That’s just a smidge more than the $1.375 million sought in 2003, when the north-facing home last appeared on the market; it eventually sold the following year for $823,500.

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Detail Oriented
04/17/14 1:00pm

Townhomes at 5918 San Felipe St., Westhaven Estates, Houston

Developer Randall Davis has been trying to buy an entire 16-unit townhome complex at the corner of San Felipe Dr. and Nantucket Ln. “They have tried multiple times to purchase,” a source tells Swamplot, noting that the offers have been rejected so far. In September of last year, Davis sent an offer of $400,000 for each unit at 5918 San Felipe St., sweetened with a $50,000 discount off the purchase price of a unit in the condo building Davis intends to build in their place. “They needed a unanimous decision” from all 16 owners, the source notes, “which did not happen.”

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The Big Buyout
03/21/14 10:45am

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Garage-style doors open on 2 levels (top) in a contemporary buy-or-lease live-work property located south of Westheimer near Chimney Rock. With its 11 parking spaces out front and double garage bay, the 2005 brick-and-Galvalume structure in Raponderosa Reserve kinda looks like a modern firehouse, though there’s no pole inside. It was dual-listed in January: $2.2 million to own, $10K per month to lease.

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Upstairs, Downstairs
02/11/14 3:45pm

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Despite an assemblage of botanical print wallpapers reflecting (sometimes literally) another interior design era, a 1975 townhome in gated Indian Trails, west of Chimney Rock Rd., also has a few features ahead of their time: like extra high ceilings, floor-to-ceiling windows, and double vanities in the bathrooms. A bit camera shy, the corner property has a $1.17 million price tag and keeps its elevation as under wraps as the perimeter windows in the listing photos. Here’s a possible hint why:

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Garden Variety, or Deeply Closeted?
01/15/14 11:00am

Rendering of the Hudson Apartments, Fountain View at Inwood, Briargrove, Houston

Tanglewood Court Apartments, 5885 San Felipe St., HoustonFor all of you keeping score, the bounties of Briargrove-area apartment demolition should should now be clear. Arising from the site of the 634-unit courtyard-style Tanglewood Court Apartments on the almost-18-acre site on the southeast corner of San Felipe and Fountain View (knocked down last year and pictured at right), there will soon be a corner bank with drive-thru, a new 88,000-sq.-ft. H-E-B (moving west from down the street, and “modeled after” the chain’s Montrose Market), a 32,000-sq.-ft. strip center, and — announced yesterday — a new 5-story 431-unit garage-wrapping apartment block called the Hudson and featuring a reverse-Alamo-style tab (illustrated above) at the top of its garage entrance for some reason. Oh, yeah, also gained in the equation: A sea of concrete for the retail parking lot:

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What Tanglewood Webs We Weave
10/25/13 11:00am

Updates to a Woodway Place townhome haven’t done away with its seventies touches entirely. There is, for example, a vertigo-worthy atrium that’s alive and well and making sure rooms on both levels get some extra rays, hanging gardens, and possibly some peek-a-boo across the way. Earlier this week, the shafted townhome hit the market with an asking price of $249,900. That’s a higher price than other 2-bedroom units in the development, but this one initially had 3 — before combining 2 of them into a whopper of a master suite on the second level.

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09/24/13 2:15pm

Hidden windows at this fortified home in Tanglewood open into a grassy front courtyard and a well-lawned southern-exposure back lot — with greenhouse. The true-to-its-origins 1963 property caps one of the cul-de-sac streets accessed off Woodway. Its listing — posted on the autumnal equinox — calls the property prime for renovation or razing. Price tag: $915,000.

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09/04/13 11:00am

It appears that some of that hallowed ground-floor retail space in the funeral-home-exorcising Gables Tanglewood will be given over to Dish Society, a casual farm-to-table joint. No opening date has been set; apparently, the restaurant just started looking for an executive chef. The photo above shows the construction progress of the Ziegler Cooper-designed 8-story, 304-unit apartment complex at the corner of San Felipe and Bering.

Photo: Going Up! City