Not far from the Bryant Street Cake Company, we walked by one of the last remaining jacked-up houses on the block. Now I normally don’t write about houses that are being fixed up, mainly because there are so many experiencing facelifts in that same neighborhood. This one was different though. This was one house that I never thought could be fixed. It was that ugly. The facade had the worst synthetic garbage siding in a rainbow of unpleasing colors. If anything I would have expected to see a bulldozer sitting out front today. Instead I found a crew stripping off the material exposing the original clapboard. I called the new owner of the property, Tim Riordan, who is with Polis Realty. This is what he had to say about ‘This Old Jacked Up House’:
“I had an idea that it was going to be nice underneath. It was good because siding preserved the wood all these years. At one point people felt that it was easier to ‘side’ a house than it was to scrape and paint it. It’s a Victorian home that went through a bad period. I already have a tenant that took the place even after I doubled the rent. I wanted to bring the high-end luxury loft living that you find downtown into an established neighborhood. Brand new floors, appliances, bathrooms… and guess what? It worked. Not only will this house be great again, the neighborhood will be better for it. I tried to get everyone to buy this house and no one wanted to buy it. I purchased it to prove what could be done. I got it for a steal and now it’s going to be one of the nicest houses on the street.”
I can’t wait to see what the end result is for this ‘sleeping beauty’. Tim has offered to take us through the inside when it’s done. This is another one of those projects that really opened my eyes to what can be found underneath some of the worst siding around. Tim also plans on adding a porch (Steel should be happy), and taking off the box-closet addition that somehow made it to the front of the house (upper left).
Bill Zimmermann
Bill runs Seven Seas Sailing school, and is a staunch waterfront activist. He is also heavily involved with preserving, maintaining, and promoting the South Buffalo Lighthouse. When Bill first started writing for Buffalo Rising, he wrote an article a day for 365 days - each article coincided with a significant historic event that happened in Buffalo on that same day.