Yards of Yard in Britmore Oaks

A day after this Memorial West home hit the market late last month, its price rose by $15,000 to $465,000 — where it remained until today. Now, in honor of the new deep discounts on the iPhone 4S, it’s been cut to $425,000. The tidy ranch-style home sits upon the clipped suburban grasslands of Britmore (one “t”) Oaks, a neighborhood that appears to have pine trees and magnolias as well as the namesake oaks. Like its neighbors, It’s a mid-fifties single-story. The street is 2 blocks south of I-10 off Brittmore Rd. (2 “t”s), has drainage gulleys, dead-ends 9 homes in, and takes a bit of a jog right out front of the property.

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There’s recent paint and new hardware throughout the home, which HCAD indicates was remodeled in 2000. Its front porch, tiled and edged with a rock-supply border as well as low-rise landscaping, stretches from the front door to the 2-car garage (above). To boost natural light from the northern face, the entry door has glass panels (below):

Pocket doors off the entry separate it (or not) from the living room and its carved mantle (at right). Floors throughout the home are either hardwoods or tile.

In the dining area, a divided, full-height picture window offers a view of the fenced back yard and patio, accessed from a door in the adjacent kitchen. There’s a hint of a room divider formed by the galley kitchen’s counter and hanging glass-fronted, glass-backed shelving. It’s a design feature that gets a multi-photo spread in the listing:

The home has 3 bedrooms and 2 full baths. One of the bedrooms has French doors leading to a wooden deck on one side of the home:

The renovated master bathroom:

The second full bath retains its original sea green tile but still looks like it has been updated at some point:

A 1,611-sq.-ft. home on a 13,734- sq.-ft. lot creates a back yard something like this:

10 Comment

  • Isn’t that the neighborhood with the mad-ass fault line?

  • No, the fault lines are up along Westview, on the other side of the freeway.

  • That neighborhood may have its faults (I lived nearby as a kid), but the geological one is on the other side of Brittmore if my memory serves.

  • Gas stove – no vent hood, though? And it doesn’t look like a downdraft model. Pity the person who has to clean those glass-fronted cabinets. And make sure the CO detector is up to date.

  • miss_msry: Yes, the Long Point fault is in the area. I used to live out that way, and know exactly where it is a bit further west, but not right here. It crosses I-10 in the vicinity of the Beltway, trending southwest. It would be a good thing to nail down in relation to this home but quite frankly, unless it is on the lot in question, it is unlikely to be a problem.

  • No, the long point fault cuts straight through the area, hitting brittmore just south of I-10, crossing saint mary’s just to the west, then going through wycliffe and Wilchester, crossing Kirkwood just south of Memorial. It goes all the way down to around Whittington just west of Dairy Ashford. But if you don’t buy a house directly on the fault, you’ll be fine. Judging from the location of this house and where the long point fault map shows the fault, this house should be fine. Its neighbor to the west, maybe not.

  • Does anyone know where to find a detailed map of Houston’s fault lines? One showing where the lines run in relation to specific blocks. I’ve emailed a U of H geology professor to no avail. You’d think it would be something local realtors would have on their geigers, excuse me, radars, but no at HAR seems to know that Houston has fault lines.

  • There is a decent fault line map at this url:
    http://www.hcfcd.org/images/PrincplActiveFaultsHC_2006-LG.jpg

    Much more than this and you would need to contact the GIS department at Harris County Flood Control (I think). The Long Point fault is interesting. More interesting to me was the Pecore fault in the Heights. I bought a home with no disclosure from the prior owner or the inspector. All the neighbors knew but I did not know them. Went to sell it after remodeling the property and it comes up. Obvious when I drive that area now. Ultimately it was a disclosure item but not an issue at sale.

  • The fault line is visible to the eye in Wilchester. Someone recently tore down a house right on the big hump and built a new one. The new one will crack too.