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PORTLAND, Ore. – A 122-year-old home in the Buckman neighborhood of Southeast Portland, once owned by a prolific artist known for painting portraits of old Portland houses, will be demolished by a developer with an uncertain number of residences being built in its place.
Photo credit: Portland Chronicle
Located at 2007 SE Yamhill St., the house was built in 1893 and totals 1,900 square feet in size. It sits on a 4,150-square-foot lot.
In March, the house sold to Wilde Properties for $369,000. This development company is registered to Mark and Erika Wilde.
Photo credit: Portland Chronicle
A short time after purchasing the house the development company listed it for sale again.
In late July the house sold for $420,000, meaning Wilde Properties received $50,000 more than it paid for the property just four months earlier without making any visible improvements.
Photo credit: Portland Chronicle
This process has been demonstrated by Wilde Properties in other cases as well. In January the development company purchased a 1919 home in the Richmond neighborhood for $150,000. Slightly more than a month later on Feb. 17 the property sold again, this time to Morrison Development Group LLC for $325,000, more than double the price Wilde Properties had paid for it.
While city and county records have not updated the ownership information for the Southeast Yamhill Street house, recently received permit applications fill in those blanks.
Photo credit: Portland Chronicle
On July 28 the city received an application for demolition of the 122-year-old house. The owner is listed as JSM Equities LLC, the applicant is Kevin Partain of Urban Visions and the contractor is Etruscan Ventures LLC.
JSM Equities LLC is registered to Steve Melkerson, a developer who formerly received media attention for neighbor opposition against a development plan that would have cut down a tree in the Mt. Tabor neighborhood. Negotiations ended with a plan that preserved the tree. The development still saw the demolition of a 1922 duplex and a 1924 single-family home.
Photo credit: Portland Chronicle
The Southeast Yamhill Street house to be demolished is listed as formerly owned by Betty Chilstrom, a Portland artist who painted numerous detailed portraits of houses around the city.
Image from Betty Chilstrom online gallery.
Many of her paintings are available in an online gallery. A short documentary on her life and artwork indicates Chilstrom died last year.
It’s unclear how many units will be proposed on the site of the Buckman home, but the 4,150-square-foot lot’s R1 zoning would allow for multiple units.
“The major type of new housing development will be multi-dwelling structures (condominiums and apartments), duplexes, townhouses, and rowhouses,” the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability says of the medium-density zone.
Photo credit: Portland Chronicle
The demolition delay for the 1893 home will likely expire Sept. 1.