Vernon Downs

Two to five bedrooms in one form from one year means alteration

A neighborhood built in 1950 to a single form does not naturally contain both two-bedroom and five-bedroom houses. Post-war housing of that period was built to a fairly narrow specification, and the range recorded here is therefore mostly the product of seventy-five years of change rather than of original variety.

That is a genuinely useful thing to understand, because it tells you what actually differentiates one house from another here — and it is not the original plan.

Houses of this era and size are among the most commonly extended and reconfigured in any market. Bedrooms get added into a lower level, over a garage, or in a rear extension. Bathrooms get added, which at this vintage is the single most common improvement of all. Garages get converted. Attics get finished.

So bedroom and bathroom count do far more work here than square footage does, and comparables must be matched on both rather than averaged. A one-bathroom original and a three-and-a-half-bathroom altered house on the same street are not the same product, and the difference is proportionally enormous in a house of this size because there is less of everything else to compensate.

That makes the permit record more valuable here than in almost any other neighborhood around here. The city's building department holds it, checking costs nothing, and it tells you whether an addition was inspected, whether an added sleeping room has proper egress, whether plumbing was vented correctly, and whether a converted space was ever brought up to standard.

For a seller of an altered house, having the permits to hand converts the largest question about the property into a documented answer. For a seller of an unaltered one, original condition is itself worth stating, because the buyer pool for a well-kept original post-war house is real.

A 1950 house, and what the era brings

Post-war housing of this period is generally well built, and its agenda sits between the pre-war questions and the modern ones.

Wiring is the first item. Service capacity of the period was often 60 amps, well short of what a modern household draws, and many houses have had the panel upgraded without all the branch circuits being replaced. An electrician establishes what is actually in the walls; the panel does not.

Plumbing second. Galvanized steel supply piping is common in this period and corrodes internally over decades, reducing flow before it fails. Drain lines are usually cast iron inside and cast iron or clay outside, and on a street with seventy-five years of tree growth, root intrusion into the lateral is the ordinary failure — a camera inspection of that line is among the better-value checks available.

Lead-based paint third: the pre-1978 disclosure requirement applies, and it is a legal obligation on a seller rather than a matter of judgment. Intact paint under later coats is generally managed; disturbed paint during renovation is the risk.

Materials fourth: buildings of this era can contain asbestos in pipe and boiler insulation, some floor tiles and adhesives, and some siding products. Identification is straightforward and undisturbed material in good condition is generally managed rather than removed.

Insulation is the item most often left untouched, and 1950 levels are well below current practice. Improving the attic is among the most cost-effective things an owner can do in a Michigan winter.

At seventy-five years nothing original survives at the end of its life by accident. Roofs will have been done several times, heating replaced more than once, windows generally changed. So the questions are when, by whom and with what — and dated records are worth more to a buyer than almost any cosmetic improvement.

The ranch, and finished basements

The ranch is the dominant form of its era and remains the most reliably in-demand form in this market, for a reason worth stating plainly: single-level living is a requirement rather than a preference for a substantial and growing number of buyers, and there are always more of those buyers than there are single-level houses. That is why ranches routinely outperform what their measured area suggests, and why the gap widens rather than narrows over time.

A ranch also has more roof per square foot of living space than a two-story house, which makes the roof a proportionally larger replacement expense. And it usually has a full basement beneath, which is where the wiring, plumbing and any period materials are visible — making it the most informative room for an inspection and the one worth spending time in.

The finished basement is what makes a compact ranch work, and it is one of the most commonly mispriced features in a house. Below-grade finished space is generally not credited by appraisers in the same way as above-grade square footage, so a house with a finished basement offers considerably more usable space than its stated area implies while appraising closer to that stated area. That is an opportunity for a buyer and a reason for a seller to describe the space carefully rather than simply adding it to a total.

A finished basement in a house of this age also conceals what an inspector would otherwise see: the foundation walls, the framing, and any staining that would indicate past water. That makes the seller's written answer about water history more valuable, not less. Check grade falling away from the building, downspouts discharging well clear, and the base of any finished wall for staining, and ask whether the sump pump has a battery backup.

And ask whether the finishing was permitted, particularly where a bedroom is in it — egress is the item that matters, and the record is free to check.

Dicken Woods and the ground nearby

Dicken Woods Nature Area is a city holding, and publicly held land is the most durable tier of protected open space: not a business that can close and be sold, and not dependent on anyone continuing to fund it out of an assessment. It is the only category that does not need somebody to keep paying for it.

That makes it a permanent feature of the location rather than a revisitable one, and it is exactly the kind of advantage a square-footage comparison ignores completely — an automated valuation reads a nature area and an unbuilt private field identically.

Ann Arbor's natural area system is also actively stewarded: invasive species removal, prescribed management in some areas, and volunteer workdays. That means the character of the land is maintained deliberately rather than allowed to drift, which for a neighboring property is a better assurance than an unmanaged parcel.

A short distance from downtown puts this neighborhood in the part of the city where mature canopy is the norm, and trees planted with a 1950 neighborhood are now well into maturity. Where they stand on private ground the obligation is entirely the owner's: an arborist's opinion on anything large near the house, four-figure removal costs, recurring pruning, and leaf drop into the gutters and valleys where roofs fail first.

Street verge trees are usually the city's, and its forestry rules govern what may be done to them, including by the adjoining owner.

The Malletts Creek watershed

Malletts Creek is a tributary of the Huron River and the main outlet for stormwater runoff from the City of Ann Arbor. Its watershed is almost entirely urban and suburban, and much of the creek runs in underground piping beneath the built-up parts of the city rather than in an open channel.

The number that explains its behavior is impervious cover. Close to thirty-seven percent of the land surface draining to Malletts Creek is impervious — roofs, roads, driveways and parking lots — which means rain that would once have soaked into ground arrives at the creek quickly and all at once. A watershed like that responds sharply to heavy rain rather than gradually.

This is public, documented ground. The Washtenaw County Water Resources Commissioner — the office formerly called the drain commissioner — is the authority for stormwater management, flood control and drainage across the county, and Malletts Creek has its own drainage district. Substantial public money has gone into the creek, including a restoration project that created a constructed wet meadow to hold and slow stormwater.

The practical consequence is that drainage is a specific question rather than a general one. The Water Resources Commissioner's office holds the drainage district records; and the city's stormwater staff can say what work has been done near a specific address and what is planned.

None of that is a reason to avoid the area — it is some of the most established residential ground in the city, and the public investment is a reason for confidence rather than concern. It is a reason to ask at the parcel level instead of assuming.

An Ann Arbor address is not necessarily the City of Ann Arbor

The City of Ann Arbor is ringed by townships — Scio, Pittsfield, Ann Arbor, Superior and Lodi among them — whose mailing addresses read Ann Arbor. A mailing address is a delivery route rather than a jurisdiction.

Each township is a separate government with its own board, tax rate, services, zoning and assessor. The rate difference between a city parcel and a township one is real and recurring, which is why comparable sales must be matched on municipality. Rates and taxable values both change, so compare the current millage and the parcel's own taxable value rather than a remembered difference; a tax bill arrives on the local schedule, and a lender collects an estimated share of it monthly.

School assignment follows a third line again and tracks neither the municipal nor the postal boundary. There are examples running in both directions: a subdivision with Ann Arbor addresses, Pittsfield Township taxes and Saline schools; and, elsewhere in Pittsfield Township, a community assigned to Ann Arbor Public Schools. Neither is derivable from the address.

Match comparable sales on district as well as on municipality.

Four tiers of protected open space

Where open ground adjoins a property, ownership is the first thing that decides whether it stays open — but not the only one.

Land held by a public body is generally the most durable, though a public body can still sell or repurpose land. Land under a recorded conservation easement is next — an easement runs with the land, surviving a change of owner and of local board. Association common area is real protection that the owners themselves pay for. Unbuilt private land carries the least protection of the four, but that is not the same as none: zoning, recorded deed restrictions and state wetland regulation can each constrain what may be built, filled or cleared, and EGLE requires authorization for specified activities affecting regulated wetland.

From a window all four look identical, which is why it is worth checking the record rather than the view: ownership, any recorded easement or restriction, the zoning, whether wetland is mapped, and whether a development application has already been approved.

Buying or selling here

The alteration history and the era checks are the two things that decide a transaction here.

For a seller, the permit record for every addition and added bathroom converts the largest question about an altered house into a documented answer, and very few sellers think to obtain it. An electrician's account of the wiring and service capacity, dated records for the roof and heating, and the lead-based paint disclosure handled properly are the rest.

Not to be confused with

• Dicken · Ann Arbor