The Utopia That Wasn't

847 Pine [Unit# ???], 90813
Price: $249,000
Beds: 1
Baths: 1
Sq. Ft.: 980
$/Sq. Ft.: $254
HOA: $226
Year Built: 2003
MLS#: P659710
On Redfin: 316 days
Down Payment: $50,000
Income Requirement: $71,000
Monthly Payment: $1,500
Description: Check out what a live/work loft space can be. Use this very hip/chic space as your living and work space, or one or the other. It's up to you! The Courtyard Lofts are 16 spaces adapted from 2 retail spaces by the esteemed firm Interstices. This project won the coveted AIA design award and is an oasis in the city. The 16 units surround a tranquil courtyard beautifully landscaped, with a fountain soon to be completed. Inside you will find a very functional living space sharing the owner's photography business. Appliances include the stove dishwasher and microwave. There is a laundry area with hookups for your convenience. This is an end unit with a nice patio in the front for socializing with your neighbors. A short few steps will take you to your 1 car garage. There has been an added sleeping loft to create more storage space. Come and check out this very unique space today!

Market-Chasing 101:

Jun 19, 2009 - Price Changed $249,000
Jun 10, 2009 - Price Changed $299,000
May 07, 2009 - Price Changed $375,000
Mar 07, 2009 - Price Changed $395,000
Oct 08, 2008 - Listed $455,000

-$206,000 in price reductions and no action. That tells us a few things:

1) This short seller is a complete tool. The sheer idiocy (and ego) involved in asking $455,000 for a one-bedroom in this 'hood is simply astounding,
2) More price reductions are on the way, and
3) The only people who give a shit about "AIA design awards" are the AIA.

Maybe I have a different idea of what a live/work property means, but this makes no sense to me:

"Inside you will find a very functional living space sharing the owner's photography business."

I have to share my living space with someone else's photography business? Or someone else owns the "work" part of my "live" section? You might want to clarify that, son.

Worse yet, there aren't any friggin' windows! I've seen more inviting mausoleums!

And a ground-floor patio "for socializing" with neighbors? What about privacy?

Just what were developers thinking when they overbuilt all of this overpriced, overdesigned stuff in downtown?

It's like these developers convinced themselves that if they just build enough overpriced units in shady areas, societal wants, needs, and priorities would somehow shift tremendously. It's as if they believed they could create a focus-grouped utoptia where an endless supply of trust fund hipsters would eschew privacy ("high-density urban living at its finest!"), disregard personal and property safety (because it's "cool" to live in gritty downtown), sell their cars and happily share public transportation with derelicts and mental patients. Really?

That's some ballsy social-engineering you tried there, gang. Hats off!

Seriously! Isn't that the world they were essentially betting would be created? That paying beucoup bucks for "city living" and suffering through the frustratingly awful aspects of downtown life would suddenly become an overwhelming trend? It's not as if they were meeting some huge demand--it seems more like a case of "If You Build it, They Will Come."

It's obvious that attempts to gentrify downtown Long Beach have failed miserably. It's just not going to happen the way they imagined. Now we're left with these monsterpieces sitting smack dab in the middle of substandard neighborhoods, complete with the arrogant expectation that people should somehow appreciate (and be happy to pay top-dollar for) all this pompous horseshit.

This ain't Brooklyn, fools.

But don't take my word for it. As it turns out, massive price cuts still aren't enough to prevent these live/work ground-floor "lofts," built way too far inland, from spending an eternity on the market, waiting in vain for a major societal shift in attitude toward piss-stained bus seats and paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for the joy of walking out your front door and seeing a homeless lady take a dump on the sidewalk.