Location, location...The Avalon house was a steal, but moving day was quite the ordealBy Alan J. Heavens
Inquirer Real Estate Writer
Posted on Sun, Sep. 03, 2006
David and Elizabeth German had the chance to buy an architect-designed house in Avalon for $1.
That's right, Avalon, the ritzy Jersey Shore community where offering $1 million for a house is considered a good starting point and $1 seems like the stuff of 999,999 dreams.
There was a catch, though. The Germans had to move the house out of town.
"It's really not all that unusual to find a house for $1 in Avalon," said David German, 57, a woodworker who makes his living crafting Adirondack chairs and picnic tables. "It's cheaper for a developer to clear a site that way than to have the house torn down."
The land - right in the middle of the island, not even spyglass-distance from the beach - went for $1.4 million. A McMansion is rising on the site, which is adjacent to a church parking lot.
Meanwhile, for their dollar, plus $50,000 in transport costs and lots of sweat equity, the Germans will be moving - in a couple of weeks, give or take a month - into a 1930s-era, Colonial-style, 1,700-square-foot house on the Tuckahoe River in Corbin City.
"We have a bet when move-in day will be," said Elizabeth German, 55, a dietitian. "He says Sept. 15, I say Oct. 15. I won't tell you what the prizes will be, but to win, he's been reaching out to anyone who can swing a hammer."
The dwelling was designed by Philadelphia architect Richardson Brognard Okie, and built in 1931 or 1932 for a Main Line matron. It cost $60,000 in the middle of the Great Depression, when the typical house cost $5,000 in 1930s dollars.
Okie (1875-1945) specialized in the restoration and reconstruction of Colonial Pennsylvania-era buildings, including the Betsy Ross House. Constructing this house also required a teardown - the Germans have been told that it may have been the first in Avalon.
"We also have been told that the woman spent just a few weeks here every year with her maid to escape the heat," David said.
The Germans have been buying and rehabbing 19th-century "wrecks" for years: two houses on Main Street, including the one they're living in now and have sold in anticipation of move-in day - whenever that will be.
"We were looking for a teardown to buy and move last fall, and we came across this one," David said.
Buying it was easy. Finding a place for it 20 miles away in Corbin City wasn't so tough, either. The Germans own property on which were sitting his workshop and a rental house. David German razed the workshop, dug a foundation for the teardown, and converted the rental to a workshop.
Moving the house? Now, that's where things got tough.
"No one seemed to want to take it on," David said, until Brian Gallagher, of Brian's Quality Plus Moving in Barnegat, agreed to do it for $50,000.
"The average rancher costs about $20,000 to move, but this is a special house, and even though he could have moved 20 ranchers in the time it took us to move our house, he stuck to his price," David said.
The design of the house forced them to cut the top floor from the bottom and move it in two pieces. David had to cut several holes in both sections to insert the beams to which the trailer wheels were attached for the move.
They had hoped to move it in December, but for various reasons the two sections of the house sat in the church parking lot for two months, covered by tarps.
In March, after all the permits were obtained, each section was moved separately (bottom floor first) 20 miles on Route 50 to Corbin City, making its way successfully over the often-unforgiving Avalon Parkway Bridge.
"We made it with a few inches to spare," David said. "A lot of things aren't so lucky."
Elizabeth German didn't watch the move or the house being assembled in Corbin City.
"Didn't want to look at it," she said. "If something went wrong, I didn't want to see it."
The bottom floor had to be lifted nine feet to sit on the new foundation. The second floor went on top of that.
Work was delayed a month, because March is the start of the chair- and picnic-table-making season.
"The foundation has a basement garage that uses the four doors from the garage on the Avalon site that couldn't be moved," David said.
"We couldn't take the chimney and the fireplace, either, so it left a hole in the center of the house through which we could run the ductwork for the gas and wood furnaces, all new plumbing and the utilities."
The 900-square-foot mahogany and cedar deck that goes about three-quarters of the way around the house has as its railing a Louisiana yellow locust fence salvaged from the Avalon property.
David German collects discarded lumber from mills as a sideline, and that's where the deck wood came from.
High-end, or "yacht," craftsmanship is a hallmark of the original house, and that manifests itself in oak tie and chestnut beams, Pennsylvania sugar pine paneling, random-width pine floors, and hand-forged nails, Elizabeth said: "They had a blacksmith on site who did the work."
"A lot of the wood used in the house no longer is available," she said. "And there is so much of it that it makes the house kind of dark, so what we have done is add just enough white paint to lighten things up without spoiling the wood."
David sanded a lot of it, too, to lighten it. He was lucky because nothing had been stained or painted, so it was all light sanding.
"By the way, we also sanded the floors on the second floor," he said. "It goes much faster when there are no walls."
They'll be adding French doors along part of the deck and opening a couple of windows to bring in more natural light without sacrificing the integrity of Okie's design.
The small kitchen was enlarged by knocking out a couple of walls. The 20-by-30-foot living room got a wall to accommodate a bedroom and bathroom.
"I like to move walls, so this job was perfect," David said.
Whoever wins the bet, the work won't stop after they've moved in.
"There's a lot of landscaping to do," Elizabeth said, "and I'm a bit nervous about it because you really need to achieve the right look."
David really wants a lap pool, "so I think that's somewhere down the road," she said.
What about moving another teardown?
"I wouldn't think twice," David said. "Of course."
"Absolutely," Elizabeth agreed. "It's been very exciting. But David has been working so hard, so he's going to need a vacation first."
Contact real estate writer Alan J. Heavens at 215-854-2472 or aheavens@phillynews.com
