Talk about charming. This new listing on Oakvale Avenue in Berkeley’s Claremont neighborhood was designed in 1914 by John Hudson Thomas, one of the Bay Area’s most important 20th-century architects. The steeply gabled, 4/2, 2,426 sq ft home is set back on a deep lot on one of the city’s prettiest streets.
A little bridge over a creek takes you to an entrance framed by a luscious fig tree. In season, the heady scent of all that ripe fruit greets you as you reach the front door. Inside, the layout is unorthodox — living areas pivot off a central hallway, there’s a cute cottage in the front garden and, unusually for Berkeley, a swimming pool out back (rather mid-century modern in style, but it all blends in somehow).
There’s no doubt this home is expensive, especially if you judge it on it $740/sq ft price. But since when did something crass like cost make a difference when the house is so gorgeous and the location is prime?
Love is blind and I predict it will be snapped up — just like nearby 2946 Russell Street, perhaps — an immaculate 3/3.5, for which, I hear, a buyer paid $2.1m cash (comfortably over its $1,950,000 asking price) just days after it listed. Credit crunch, what credit crunch?
Price: $1,795,000
Per sq ft: $740
Open on: Sunday 26 October.
Related: 28 Oakvale Avenue sold in June for $1,350,000; 6421 Benvenue Avenue: another John Hudson Thomas recently reduced to $1,049,000.
In brief: Oodles of charm.
[...] beautiful John Hudson Thomas home at 35 Oakvale Avenue, one of the nicest Berkeley homes I know, has gone off the market, presumably for lack of serious [...]