I have only skimmed the replies, but I seriously doubt there is a single thing wrong with the house. Other than it's "small" for the area, and someone with major $$$ wants a bigger, newer house on that lot. You're paying for the land. That whole area of town is tearing down perfectly amazing houses and putting up enormous monstrosities because they CAN. It's so, so sad. One suburb has an entire staff position dedicated to teardowns/rebuilds. It's awful, and killing the history of our city.
I could easily die a happy woman in any room in this house.
Hahaha! We bought our glider on CL from the people who owned this house (4+ years ago...) I google mapped the address and just about died of happiness when I saw where the house was. I was only on the main floor and only for as long as it took H and the other guy to load the glider in the car. Still, the house was amazing. The wife cried when we took the glider. She said, "I hope that you enjoy rocking your baby in it. I rocked all four of my babies in it and I couldn't bear to just throw it away. It needs to rock more babies to sleep." So sweet.
Yes, that house is a gut house. We walked through some like that, and just couldn't do it. Stunningly beautiful bones, but INSANE amounts of work that needs to be done. And if any of you have watched even 10 minutes of This Old House, you'll know that it isn't just a matter of re-wiring something, or moving a little bit of plumbing. It's "ok, well, we thought it was simple, but when we opened up this wall for wiring it turns out it's filled with asbestos and the wood is completely rotted, so we'll just demo this side of the house, and since we know it's in that wall, it's also probably in every other wall, so one wall at a time, we'll tear it down, reinforce the roof (which we'll also replace with slate) while the wall is down, and rebuild your house. Good news though! All the fancy woodwork will be painstakingly removed and refinished with Q-tips, so it will look amazing."
Confession: I've become obsessed with looking at real estate listings. We aren't moving but I like to see what's out there. I searched for houses built no later than 1900 just to see what came up. :-)
Oh man, that is beautiful. There has to be something up with it for it to be marketed as a total remodel/tear down. Sad Maybe that Nicole Curtis Rehab Addict should buy it!!