Unfortunately the auction raises some serious concerns. Over a third of the houses are assessed at $10,000 or less & are on devastated streets.

These rundown minimally assessed houses already owned by the city are those that would likely be demolition-worthy in a city proposing to spend $100 million over five years to demolish 5,000 surplus buildings.

Many of the houses are on the very streets (especially the 6 houses assessed from $5K to $15.9K on devastated Koons St) that would be landbanked if the city has a comprehensive plan. Has landbanking been considered?

And the small auction, likely to draw few buyers, is being held a month prior to the much larger In-rem (tax) auction in mid-October, normally held in the Convention Center.

Currently there are 4,055 properties up for city tax auction, making it possible that it might last three days as it did last year. Having the two auctions scheduled back-to-back on the same days would likely draw many more bidders.

R. Kern

Two quotes from Rebecca: "288 Hudson is an awesome house" and "The house needs a lot of work - probably all new plumping and electrical. It's absoutely full of trash - really full. The trash is so high throughout that it covers the couches."

So I have a question for you: Do you 1) own or have another financial stake in this house 2) have friends who do, or 3) really think that with all the housing on the market in this city that anyone in their right mind would want this piece of crap of a house?

The property in these photos look like they came from Detroit or New Orleans. Ewwww. Who would want them?

Since the city can't provide rehab dollars, they certainly can sell more properties for $1.00. It will solve the vacancy problem, and get them on the tax rolls.

I don't necessarily object to what magnum suggests about lowering the price, but how in the world will that solve the vacancy problem?

Even if the city gave away these houses for free, or even paid people to take ownership (i.e. AM&A's building), it's a huge leap to think that most of these auctioned houses would actually get rehabbed, occupied, and back on the tax rolls.

Yes it's always a nice feel-good anecdote in rare cases when a vacant old house is rehabbed and actually occupied again, but there's many thousands of vacant houses in Buffalo, and more becoming vacant every week, because Buffalo no longer has enough population to fill all of the houses standing here.

That's the thing about residential real estate - it requires a sufficient customer base of residents to make it work.

Rebecca's first paragraph says she didn't buy the awesome 288 Hudson house because she couldn't afford a hypothetical bidding war which never ended up happening, and then her last paragraph says she doesn't have the financial means to buy it.

This is not in any way mean as a criticism of Rebecca, but that reality check points out the purchase price is a relatively small part of the picture compared to costs and efforts of massive rehab, finding a continuing stream of responsible qualified tenants to provide that "serious rent" she speaks of, longer term work for maintenance repairs and landlording, and accepting very slow growth equity values in a shrinking city.

I'm not saying that particular house can't be saved with a lot of heroics and financial risk taking - no doubt it could. And I'm not saving it shouldn't be saved if somebody wants to. That kind of house is great to have around here.

However, people should not claim these kinds of rehabs will address Buffalo's severe vacant house problem in any meaningful way. Whoever eventually occupies the three units of 288 Hudson is very likely to result in the ripple effect of creating vacant units elsewhere within Buffalo. Maybe that's a net positive if the quality of occupied housing stock climbs, but it does not reduce the vacancy problem - just shifts residents into a formerly vacant house while creating other vacancies here.

Thanks WCP for this article. I'll be at the auction, hopefully not alone.

Thanks Steel, I added a link to the Hudson post in the test.

Magnum, I agree you make a reasonable point that my statement was a generalization and I should've worded it more as such.

It's anyone's guess whether all 3 units of that Hudson house for example would be filled by tenants from the burbs, but it does sound far-fetched to me that none of those 3 units would be filled by a current city dweller, thus creating a vacancy. Far-fetched, but I acknowledge not impossible.

I stand behind my point in the big picture though. The number of people wanting to move into Buffalo city limits who haven't already done so (when there's already so many good affordable houses and apartments here) is, as you point out not zero, but still is clearly much smaller than the number of vacant houses.

Rehabbing old houses has many benefits and I'm all for it - but realistically it won't make a big impact to the problem of so many 1000s of vacant dangerous blighted houses here that nobody wants to reside in. For that severe problem, the city's announced focus on demolitions is long overdue.

Rebecca, as my comment said nothing I wrote was meant to criticize you so no need to defend based on anything I wrote... but maybe you were referring to someone else. Regarding the Hudson St house, it certainly sounds as if it's possible somebody will want to save it and that would be great if it succeeds.

I don't understand what people are saying about making vacant housing elsewhere. This is a college town - lots of students want to rent. My tenants were going to be UB professional/grad students leaving the horribleness that is on campus living. After one year on campus, lots of people want to move to Allen/Elmwood. This is a block from Allen. If students had the opportunity to live somewhere besides the campus and "SUNY Amherst", they might not leave the second they graduate.

How is it that opportunity is not already there? Seems to me most students who want to live in Allentown or Elmwood, etc. already do so. What would be holding them back? Certainly not lack of available apts for rent. I agree that if a greater number of college students decide to live in the city that would help. But in many cases students want cheaper rents than would be needed by a landlord to pay off costs of renovating and maintaining a house like that. Also, from people I know, on-campus and near-campus residential is very popular. Not everybody is as much of a city lover as BRO readers are.

Simply put, the reason I think adding new residential units will usually vacate housing elsewhere is it seems to me there's a surplus of nice apts for rent in Buffalo. More available nice places than qualified tenants seeking to rent them. I'm basing that on observations and anecdotes, so maybe I'm wrong and maybe there are more people who want to move from the burbs than there are currently available apts in the city - but my perception is that it's the other way around. And if I'm right, then each new unit results in some other unit remaining vacant longer. That's not 100% bad, but my only point was that it doesn't help the vacancy problem either as was claimed. But hey maybe the Hudson house is so great it would attract people currently in burbs who otherwise wouldn't move to the city. I wonder if the students you planned to rent to end up moving to other apts in the city. If so, that's consistent with my point since if they had moved to yours then the ones they did move to would've stayed vacant longer. If they stayed in Amherst it helps make your point.

Anyhow good luck with the house you are buying.

What's the best way to find out who owns the corner property next to 204 High? Without it, I'm not sure how you justify the investment (in 204). As a package, you could do something worthwhile, with a view of the Medical campus.

BRO Also highlighted 288 Hudson Which has an interesting history and reportedly very beautiful interior detailing.

See it here: http://buffalorising.com/story/own_a_piece_of_history

269 Pennsylvania looks like a gem waiting to be polished!

Rebecca, By chance I happened to see that house this past thursday (outside only) and am interested in knowing more about it. My son lives in buffalo and is looking for something to buy. I'm the financing. (lol) . If you can, drop me a line at tcapo@nycap.rr.com, or call me at 518-641-9024. Appreciate it. Tony