After rehab, fixer is now half-million-dollar baby

The last time Al Johnson was inside the house at 4425 Cascadia Ave. S. in Columbia City, there were no walls.

"You've done a nice job," Johnson told owner Thomas Loeser after touring the rehabilitated 1911 Craftsman house Monday.

Johnson, an associate broker with Windermere Real Estate, was the listing agent who sold the "extreme fixer" in February to Loeser and his brother, Derek -- lawyers when they're not fixing up houses.

In recent years, many developers have fixed up run-down houses and then put them right back on the market. The Loesers' house offers an extreme example.

They paid $315,000 for the run-down abode Feb. 20 and put it back on the market for $549,000 last weekend. Thomas Loeser wouldn't say how much they spent on renovations, but acknowledged that one agent who said back in February the house would take $150,000 in work wasn't far off.

Johnson speculated just before the sale that the house, once fixed up, could fetch $150,000 over the sales price in the current market -- at most.

So, $549,000?

"Let's see what happens," Johnson, who is not representing the house this time, said Monday.

But Loeser said there's no reason a nice house in that area shouldn't sell for $549,000. "I think what this neighborhood needed to sell a $500,000-plus house was a $500,000-plus house."

		Karen Ducey / P-I
	The original listing agent, Al Johnson of Windermere, left, checks out a house for sale that belongs to developer and lawyer Tom Loeser, right, in Columbia City. Johnson was the original agent who sold Loeser the house in March.

One reason for the price is that the Loesers spent more on the renovations than needed. Beyond the necessary work, they ran natural gas into the house, installed upscale tile in the bathrooms and high-end granite countertops and appliances in the kitchen. There are cedar decks and solid hemlock doors, plus added touches such as bathroom skylights and individual dimmer reading lights in the master bedroom.

The house wasn't a complete blank slate. It still had much of the framing for walls, wood floors and box-beam ceilings -- which Johnson said he was happy to see saved.

"I wish they had kept more, but it would have been fabulously expensive to do so," he said.

Thomas Loeser said he was sorry he couldn't save the fir floors on the second floor.

"They were just too beat up," he said. Instead, they put in wall-to-wall carpeting.

But he has no regrets about tearing out one of the more complete features -- a wall of wood cabinets and shelves that divided the kitchen and dining room. Removing the wall made the space more open and bright, he said.

After his original contractor didn't work out soon into the project, Loeser brought in Bret Pemberton, a friend of 30 years who owns Summit Builders, as the new contractor and also put in some work himself. He borrowed ideas for the front porch, railing and exterior color scheme from his own house. Workers suggested other touches, such as dyeing and stamping the concrete driveway and walkways.

He got to know the neighbors, he said, who told him about the history of the old house.

"The kids called it the 'scary house,' " said Victoria Harris, who has lived two doors down for 15 years and visited the house Monday. "They'd run by."

Harris' sister, Diane Burns, said she had fantasized over the years about buying and fixing up the place. Harris lauded the renovations.

"It's really lifted us all up," she said.

Now the last, really ugly old house on the block -- across the street from the Loesers' -- is under repair. But that doesn't make Thomas Loeser completely happy. "They're right now at the ugliest stage of the rebuild."

Other houses on the block clearly could use some attention, too, something Loeser said would be more likely to happen as projects such as his contribute to higher property values.

Although he wouldn't say how much he and his brother put into the house, Loeser insisted they didn't expect to make much off the project.

"Hopefully the house will generate enough revenue that we can roll it into another house just like it," he said.

LOTS OF WORK

The 1911 Craftsman house that brothers Thomas and Derek Loeser recently overhauled in Columbia City needed a lot of work, including: