Indianapolis Real Estate Blog and Real Estate Investments Resource

Here is some more pictures of tear out.

Now that I got my Blog publishing program working with with images, here is the rest of the images I have taken and some of the past ones in a larger format.

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Today we tore out all the floors in three bathrooms as well as the laundry room in one side.

The 40 yard dumster we rented is full, so we are at a stand-still on pulling all the junk and throwing away until tomorrow when our 20 yard dumster shows up. That should be enough for the rest of the junk.

We are having our HVAC guy come out and see about putting central air/forced air heat in. Right now it’s window air conditioning and baseboard heat. I don’t think it will be bad to put central air in, as this is on a crawl space. I’ll keep you posted.

Would you like to know the value of your home for free? Just go to http://ZionsvilleHomesOnline.com and click on “FREE CMA” at the top of the page. You will receive a free CMA via email, no obligation to you!Technorati Tags: homes

(January 30, 2006) — High-flying Internet pioneers have traded online businesses for real estate opportunities, reports Forbes magazine.

Here is what some of these former electronic high-flyers are doing now:

• Steve M. Case, former chairman of AOL Time Warner, is now the majority owner in Miravel, a spa in Arizona.
• Thomas Jermoluk, former head of ExciteAtHome, partnered with James Clark, founder of Silicon Graphics, Netscape, and Healtheon, to build a pair of luxury condo towers in Miami.
• Timothy Koogle, former chief executive of Yahoo, is developing el Banco, a luxury community on Mexico’s Pacific coast where lots start at $4.7 million. “It’s a huge amount of fun to take a bare piece of land and create a great product for it,” Koogle says.
• Ben Addoms, former top executive for ExciteAtHome, co-founded luxury residence club Quintess. Members pay a fee, plus annual dues of $10,500 to $30,500, to stay in mansions around the world. “All of us that went through the boom and the bubble have traded that high-risk, high-reward experience for something with a little more predictability,” Addoms says.
• Jonas P. Lee, founder of Giftcertificates.com, is now managing partner of Redbrick Partners, which buys single-family homes around the United States. “I didn’t look at this as a real estate play. It makes all the sense in the world — you go from one entrepreneurial industry to another entrepreneurial industry,” Lee says.

Source: Forbes, Sara Clemence (02/13/06)

Technorati Tags: real, estate, homes, lots

Here is some pictures during our initial tear out at Vine Street. This is a 3 bedroom 3 bath and a 2 bedroom 2 bath duplex full brick in downtown Plainfield. Purchased for a really great price. I will put more details on this later on.

A new PhoneBlog has been left! Click here to listen to it! Flash movie looks like this:

My third investment property was a single family home in Terre Haute. This I will have to say was a mistake and shouldn’t have been purchased. A good friend of mine lived in Terre Haute and had someone build him a home. I liked it so much I had one built two doors down from him. It’s a nice home and well-built 3 bedroom 2 bath, but it’s very far away. I have never had a problem renting it out. The issue is with taxes, why on earth is real estate taxes so high in Terre Haute? I still havnt’ figured this one out.

That home is worth about 90k and I have been paying $2,800/year in taxes. I own a home in Zionsville worth 200k that I pay $2,000/year in taxes. I believe state officials don’t want anyone to understand this. I feel I am somewhat intelligent, but the real estate taxes in Indiana does not make sense.

I am getting off on a tangent…..Broadripple, I own several duplexes there, including my second investment property. When taxes were reassessed a few years ago my taxes doubled and sometimes tripled. I had one duplex where the taxes went from $2,000/year to $5,400/year. I got a tax attorney involved and was able to get this dropped down to $4,000/year, but still very high. This duplex is worth $210k. Washington Township has horrible schools(IMHO) So why does Washington Township have the highest tax rates in Marion County? Some say it’s because the homes are older, well that is all fine, but taxes aren’t based on the age of the home, it’s based on what the value is!

So once again it doesn’t make any sense…it was just an excuse to raise taxes and most people dont’ understand and the government doesn’t want us to understand it.

Technorati Tags: real, estate, homes

So I have now owned it for about 6 years. Same tenants are here(not something that happens very often). I havn’t really had to do a lot to the property other then replace the furnances on both sides and replace the gas pipes on the one side. I have been very fortunante. It was a well built duplex which didn’t hurt!

I have this on a 15 year note, so I have about 8-9 years left for it to be paid off. The bad thing is, the rental market has been tough in Indiana and the rest of the country. I raised both sides rent one time 2 years after purchase, but dont’ feel I can really raise rent again right now. The rental market is coming back now that interest rates are starting to creep up, but this will take some time. I should be able to raise rents nicely over the next few years.

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Duke in talks with store that offers groceries and more

By George Piper/The Lebanon Reporter

Lebanon — A large retailer offering groceries and other products may be anchoring Duke’s Marketplace at Anson at Ind. 334 near the Interstate 65 interchange.

Craig Anderson, vice president of Indiana property operations for Duke Realty Co., told the Boone County Commissioners on Monday the client is not Wal-Mart, although he did not identify the potential tenant.

Anderson, who attended Monday’s meeting to ask about engineering for Phase II, said the potential client is bigger than just a grocery store, which was the initial target.

Commissioner Charles Eaton asked if it was a store like Meijer, the Michigan-based superstore, which sells both grocery and department store products. Anderson replied, “It’s one that has everything. It’s not a Wal-Mart.”

The company contacted both Kroger and Marsh about the site, Anderson said. After nine months and completing a demographic study, Kroger declined interest at this time. Marsh, which may be sold, never got back with Duke.

Anderson expects Duke to appear before the Area Plan Commission in February or March to discuss retail shops as part of a 40,000-square-foot retail development. “We’ll have multiple projects to bring forward this year,” he said.

Outside the meeting room, Anderson said the large retail client is someone Duke has worked with before. While the company doesn’t want to sound too confident, Anderson said negotiations were going well. One possibility, he said, is Duke gets a commitment for the site, with a store to follow in late 2007 or early 2008.

On the smaller retail shops, Anderson described the potential tenants as entrepreneurs - including three restaurants - instead of established national clients. With a project like Anson, which is moving just ahead of the growth curve, it’s not uncommon for the major retail stores to wait, he said. That will change, he believes, as infrastructure is in place and construction occurs.

“Then it will go from, ‘Will it happen?’ to ‘It’s a reality. I want to be there,’” Anderson said.

Commissioners President Huck Lewis believes a superstore would be a plus for Boone County. “It all fits into the plan for Anson being a mixed use development,” he said.

On the Phase II development, Duke is offering to pay upfront for engineering fees and be reimbursed for that investment after tax increment financing is established. Duke has moved ahead with design work and is anxious to start Anson’s next phase.

“There are things that can be reviewed now so that we can move on,” Anderson said.

Components of Phase II include construction of 400E from County Road 400S through the development, plus Anson Boulevard and Progress Drive, which are two main streets within Anson.

Anderson has been working with Boone County Economic Development Corp. to attract clients. While interest is there, the main stumbling block is lack of infrastructure, he said.

The county and Duke are “real close” on Phase II TIF negotiations, Lewis said.

The commissioners accepted Duke’s offer, with a stipulation that if TIF funds fail to materialize, Duke - not the county - bears the financial burden.

How the county will choose an engineer is undecided.

Eaton wants the commissioners to get bids for the project, saying the county has a fiduciary responsibility to the taxpayers. In the past, he has raised the issue that the commissioners employed the Phase I engineering firm - Beam, Longest and Neff - without seeking competitive bids. The decision to award that $700,000-plus contract came before Eaton took office in January 2005.

Lewis said the county followed procedures similar to the Indiana Department of Transportation on awarding contracts.

State statute does not require counties to seek bids for projects that fall under professional services, but a county may request proposals.

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George Piper/Lebanon Reporter

Park space always has been a part Duke Realty Co.’s plans for its Anson development. Just how nice the park will be comes down to money.

The company would like a $1 million federal transportation enhancement grant solves part of that problem. Duke wants to use the money for a bike and pedestrian trail system within Anson.

Duke plans to match $500,000 of the $1.5 million project for North Gateway Park, which comprises about 8 acres of greenspace that stretches north to south. The company’s contribution exceeds the required 20 percent local match.

The Boone County Board of Commissioners endorsed the plan at its meeting Monday, Dec. 5. Last week, the commissioners gave its stamp of approval to similar transportation grant request by the Hoosier Rails-to-Trails Council to purchase land for a trail running from Lebanon to the Clinton County line.

In both cases, the groups submitting the application are not seeking county funds, but needed approval by a local entity as part of the grant process.

The trails could be the beginning for the Anson park. Plans call for an outdoor amphitheater, a civic arts garden with an educational component and a zero-depth pool, a swimming pool with a floor that’s the same level as the water surface on a portion of its perimeter.

“We want it to be the kind of park where a family is willing to drive 20 to 30 miles to use this park,” said David Boncosky of Duke. Making the amenities attractive could help Anson’s retail clients, he added, or attract potential homeowners.

Those amenities won’t come cheaply. The price tag of the fully developed park is about $3.5 million and is not currently in the budget.

Boncosky said Duke wants to develop partnerships to secure funding.

Jim Dunning, a consultant with Thomas P. Miller and Associations, said his firm assisted Duke with the grant process. Applications to the Metropolitan Planning Organization, which handles all grants for the Indianapolis area, are due Dec. 13. The deadline to submit to the state is Jan. 31.

While greenspace is typical in some Duke developments, this project is beyond what the company normal undertakes.

“We’re really looking to take this to another level in our development,” said Duke Vice President Craig Anderson.

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