Monthly Archives: August 2017

By Rooted In Chicago, Chicago Now | August 13th, 2017   Ever notice a nice-looking house or building which has been vacant for years and no one seems to know why?  You might assume that even though the outside of the structure is attractive, surely the inside must be a wreck (busted pipes, moldy walls, nests of raccoons and possums swapping stories about the good old days, etc).  Surprisingly, this is often not the case.  If structure has been winterized and properly sealed up to keep out the elements, it can sometimes sit vacant for years while experiencing only an insignificant amount of interior damage. [...]

By Brett Widness, Urban Land Institute | August 9th, 2017   For more than a decade, the brick “two-flat” on the 900 block of North Drake Avenue on Chicago’s West Side had been vacant. During the housing boom, a contractor began converting the building, a two-story detached home with two separate apartments and a basement, into a three-unit condominium, with plans to develop the basement level into a garden unit. But the job was never finished, the property was abandoned, and the condo units fell into foreclosure. Neighbors said the property became a hangout for heroin addicts, evidenced by the [...]