Month Two: Price Reduced

2006.08.11

While I was tilling for the West Garden today, Nate wandered around taking photos of my shabby neighborhood.  This mattress and box springs showed up a couple weeks ago in front of the house next door.  Nate called it in to the city, but I don’t expect them to actually do anything about it.

You would think that the seller would put forth the effort to remove them, since they’re in front of his house on the market.  But he hasn’t even mowed the weeds since the renters moved out, or any other kind of maintenance and upkeep that I can tell.  Is this guy serious about selling the house or not?  Of course, maybe he figures “why bother?”  It’s not like this is a great-looking neighborhood…

When Nate called the city about the mattresses next door, she asked him if we wanted to complain about the junk pile across the street too.  I love how the city is happy to document complaints about trash and debris… but reluctant to come out and clean it up.

The house shown above is down the street, and this is about as clean as it ever looks.  Usually the driveway is completely filled with junky old trucks and cars in various stages of “fixin’ up”.  The occupants appear to be an extended family, but there’s one guy in his 20’s to 30’s whose modus operandi seems to be all things automobile.  The other day I walked by and he was welding in the driveway.  I had to walk out into the street to avoid the sparks.  Then there was the time about a year ago when he was painting a pickup truck with cans of black spraypaint…  I could go on and on.

This sketchy-looking car has been sitting next to my driveway and the apartments at the end of the street for at least a week now.  Note the lack of a license plate in front, but the tags on the rear plate are still good.  So, as per City of Portland regulations, they won’t haul it off.  Once again, a big shout out to the city for keeping Portland beautiful.

2006.08.17

Noted today that the price has been lowered to $215,900.  This was after reading an article in the Oregonian about how the market is slowing down.  I guess the seller will go down another $10,000 every month?

2006.08.23

While watering the flowers after work, I saw that the mattresses next door have disappeared.  Don’t know if they were taken by the city, or someone desperate, but at least they’re gone.