After hearing news that a homebuilder bought the 8-unit 1939 brick-and-glass-block Josephine Apartments 2 blocks north of Rice University in Boulevard Oaks, it may not come as much of a surprise to learn that the building’s new owner plans to tear them down. But today a source provides confirmation that demolition and new construction is in the cards: Tricon Homes has informed residents that they will need to vacate the property by mid July.
That little 84-year-old barber shop spot at 219 E. 11th St. in the Heights featured in Wes Anderson’s movie Rushmore has survived an eviction scare. Proprietor Doug Dreher tells the Houston Press‘s Dianna Wray that a Saturday-night email from the building’s landlord, J. Conti Interests, assured him that Doug’s Barber Shop wouldn’t be kicked out: “Dreher remembered dropping off the October rent check before going out of town for a few weeks. When he got back to town, just before the end of the month, he was notified that his business, located at 219 East 11th Street, was being evicted in two weeks.”
The resident tipster who let us know about the pending evictions at Westcreek at River Oaks Apartments sends in this “makeshift map,” which provides a more accurate view on the changes coming — for now, anyway — to the complex directly behind the so-called River Oaks District. As the map makes clear, the tipster explains that, according to the Westcreek property manager, only 2 of the 6 buildings have been sold and are slated for demolition: B and D, right next to the Target on San Felipe. Still, the remaining 4, to which some of the displaced residents have agreed to be relocated, are for sale.
Map: Swamplot inbox
Note: Story updated below. And read more here.
Though their neighbors at 4444 Westheimer were assigned “move out concierges” to help with their “residence transitions,” it doesn’t appear that the tenants at the Westcreek at River Oaks apartments, just east of the Loop and south of San Felipe, will enjoy the same luxury, now that they’ve been asked to leave, too. (Though they will get their security deposits back!) A tipster explains that eviction notices from property owners Kaplan Management Co. were delivered late last week politely requiring that 2 of the buildings at 2049 Westcreek Ln. be vacated by the end of November, so they can be torn down. Why? The notice explains that “the community is being redeveloped.”
A resident at this 1970s apartment complex tells Swamplot that it has been sold and that notices to vacate by the end of September have been sent around: Demolition, the resident suspects, is nigh. The 21-unit, 13,750-sq.-ft. complex sits at 1407 Missouri, between Commonwealth and Waugh in Hyde Park just 2 blocks north of foodie row — Hay Merchant, Underbelly, Blacksmith, etc. — along Westheimer. County records show that the 18,625-sq.-ft. property was sold as recently as March to Legacy Community Health Endowment.
Photo: Swamplot inbox
PEARL BAR LOCKED OUT ON WASHINGTON AVE. 
Landlord Eva Hughes has changed the locks on her building, reports Chris Gray, for Pearl Bar’s non-payment of rent: According to Hughes’s attorney, adds Gray, eviction “proceedings” are underway. This isn’t the first time the tenants at 4216 Washington Ave. have had a visit paid by such sober guests: “[I]n January agents from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission and state comptroller’s office visited the bar and confiscated cash to count against a back-tax bill a comptroller’s spokesman estimated at more than $40,000.” [Hair Balls] Photo: Pearl Bar
A result of the news yesterday that H-E-B will be moving from its Fountain View and Westheimer store to a new one on San Felipe in 2014 is the impending demolition of Tanglewood Court apartments, which stand on the 18-acre property bound by Fountain View, San Felipe, and Inwood. (The photo shows the apartments from the corner of Fountain View and Inwood.) Lynn Davis of Fidelis, which purchased the site in September 2011, tells Swamplot that notice has been given to residents that they’ll need to move by the end of March or early April. Buses from neighboring complexes, says Davis, have been shuttling them around to help them find a new place to live.
And once they’re gone, what, besides the H-E-B, will go in their place?
“Move out concierges” are standing by to assist renters in the massive 4444 Westheimer apartment complex to deal with their impending evictions residence transitions. “Each resident has a specific member of our concierge team assigned to assist them to make their transition as smooth as possible,” a release sent to the Chronicle by property owner Oliver McMillan states. “In addition, we have developed a comprehensive move out package which includes a listing of neighboring communities, moving procedures and an incentive plan. The move-out plan includes incentive payments for up to a one-month rebate of rent plus return of full security deposits. Our concern for our residents is that we help them find a new home and that their move from 4444 Westheimer is done in a safe manner for everyone who lives there.”
No matter their function, the presence of actual concierges should help upgrade the overall feel of the property, which used to be known as the Westcreek Apartments. Oliver McMillan plans to move it, too: To River Oaks. After the apartments near the corner of Westcreek and Westheimer (just west of the Highland Village Shopping Center) are demolished (sparing units north of Bettis Ave.), the company plans to change the property’s name to the River Oaks District, and begin construction there of a $275 million mixed-use center.
HOW QUICK TO KICK ’EM OUT AND TEAR IT DOWN? “Can a developer who buys an apartment building (or duplex, four-plex, etc.) simply ignore an existing lease’s terms and give 30 days notice before knocking it down to build something new? Half the real estate developer/lawyer types I know have told me ‘no way.’ They say a contract is a contract and the new owner has to abide by that and let you live out the lease or offer a buyout. But the other half say there’s a loophole in Houston permitting that says if the new owner plans to tear down the building, once they have their variance granted, they can ignore the lease terms and just give 30 days notice to move out. Help! Do you have the definitive answer?” [Swamplot inbox]
LIKE PULLING TEETH: SCREWED UP RECORDS WON’T BE EVICTED EASILY 
Houston hip-hop landmark Screwed Up Records & Tapes is facing eviction from its longtime South Park storefront, says the Houston Press. The building’s owner, Dr. Zeb F. Poindexter III, reportedly has plans to expand his dental business into the store’s space at 7717 Cullen Blvd. From early 1998 until his death in late 2000, the CD and tape shop served as the musical headquarters for Robert Earl Davis Jr., also known as DJ Screw, who pioneered Screwston’s “chopped and screwed” sound. The store has been run by family and friends ever since. Blog reporter Rizoh says an eviction judge has ruled in Poindexter’s favor, but that Screwed Up Records & Tapes has filed an appeal and is waiting for a new court date. [Rocks Off; store info and samples]
Highland Village owner Haidar Barbouti “probably didn’t get hung up on the legal nuances†of how to shake Tootsies free of its Westheimer store when its lease ended, a source explains to Swamplot. But both he and Tootsies owner Mickey Rosemarin are ready to move on. Now that the court skirmish over the eviction and the store’s subsequent request for a restraining order have been formally resolved in Tootsies’ favor, Rosmarin’s clothing boutique will be able to stay at its Highland Village location through the end of the month. At which point, according to a store spokesperson, “The store will close one night and open the next business day†at West Ave. The new mixed-use complex at Kirby and Westheimer reportedly lured the retailer into a lease with generous terms: forgoing base rent in exchange for a percentage of Tootsies’ sales.
ALL THEY WANTED FOR CHRISTMAS WAS THE SKYLANE WEST 
Here’s a heartwarming holiday story. Embarrassed by media reports that all residents of the Skylane West apartments on I-10 were being kicked out of their homes with only 10 days’ notice just days before Christmas, the property’s new owners have given tenants, many of whom pay weekly, a wonderful Christmas present: Now they’ll be kicked out of their homes just days before New Year’s. Sonia Azad reports the new owners of the property just across the Beltway from CityCentre is Houston Garden Centers, which operates a nursery next door to the ratty complex and plans to tear it down. In the holiday spirit, the company “extended family leases through December 29 and gave them each $500 Walmart gift certificates. In an email, the new owner says, ‘We had no idea that there were children living here.'” [abc13] Image: 39Online
CAN’T EVICT THEM BEFORE THEY LEAVE District F city council member Al Hoang failed in his bid yesterday to have a justice of the peace evict an organization calling itself Vietnamese Community Services from the Vietnamese Community of Houston and Vicinities building across the street from Plazamericas in Sharpstown. In a hearing the Chronicle‘s Moises Mendoza describes as “bizarre,” Hoang told Judge Russ Ridgway the Vietnamese Community Services name sounds too much like that of the building’s owners, and that the result was “too confusing.” Hoang is a former president of the Vietnamese Community of Houston and Vicinities, which also goes by the acronym VNCH. In May, he helped the organization win city council approval of a $400,000 community development block grant — to renovate the VNCH building. “Although Vietnamese Community Services has been in the building for 18 months, Hoang said he only recently discovered it’s not calling itself Vietnamese Elders Association, as he believed it had been since the group first moved into the building at 7100 Clarewood Drive. Vietnamese Community Services offers hot meals and English classes, among other things, to elderly community members. Hoang has been demanding that Vietnamese Community Services change its name or move elsewhere for the last few months, but the executive director of the organization refuses to do that.” Earlier this week, that organization’s executive director, Kim Nguyen, told Chronicle columnist Lisa Falkenberg that her group had already planned to move to a new location next month, so that the building could be renovated. [Houston Chronicle; Falkenberg column]
Did Matthew Dilick, managing partner of the partnership that owns the 7.68-acre site of the former Wilshire Village Apartments, really refer to the long-term tenants of the long-neglected property at the corner of West Alabama and Dunlavy — many of whom had lived in their apartments and paid rent for decades before they were evicted last year — as “squatters”?
In a February 1st affidavit he provided to the 133rd District Court in hopes it might help forestall Wedge Real Estate Finance from foreclosing on the property, Dilick states that “the Plaintiff [Alabama & Dunlavy Ltd., of which Dilick is the general partner] expended considerable time and expense in evicting squatters on the Property.” This just a page or so after declaring his qualifications: “The Plaintiff and/or limited partners of the Plaintiff have owned this Property for over 50 years.”
Gosh, maybe there’s a bit of confusion here? Maybe the “squatters” Dilick is referring to weren’t the actual long-term rent-paying Wilshire Village residents, but some other people he found hiding out in the complex who didn’t have authorization to be there from “the Plaintiff and/or limited partners of the Plaintiff”?
Uh . . . no. By “squatters,” Dilick clearly means Wilshire Village’s long-term residents. The ones he sent eviction notices to; the ones he addressed as “reported occupants” in the release forms he asked them to sign. Otherwise, why should it have taken “considerable time and expense” for Dilick to evict them? How about just . . . “shoo!”?
Neatly left out of the affidavit: The apparent ongoing conflicts Dilick had with Jay Cohen, the sole owner of the property for the bulk of those 50 years. Until they were evicted, the tenants paid their rent to him every month. What’s Cohen’s role?
A person familiar with the situation writes in:
The Wilshire Village Apartments at Alabama and Dunlavy have been surrounded with a chain link fence topped with barbed wire since Friday, reports a Swamplot reader. And over at the Chronicle, Nancy Sarnoff confirms that the now-vacant complex is “set to be demolished.”
Swamplot readers may especially enjoy parsing this passage:
In 2005, the owner announced plans to tear it down and possibly build an upscale tower in its place.
Matt Dilick, a commercial real estate developer who controls the partnership that owns Wilshire Village, said the demolition process will start “relatively soon.â€
“The buildings are unsafe, and for numerous years prior groups have not kept the buildings maintained or the property up to city code,†he said. “The dilapidated buildings are an eyesore to the public and to the numerous homeowners and businesses in the area.â€
Helpful hint: the “owner” who announced plans to tear down the complex way back in 2005 was . . . Matt Dilick.
Extra credit: Unwrap the sequence of events Sarnoff gently suggests in this passage:
