My husband and I are in our mid-70s. We were lucky enough to buy our first house in 1976 when we were 25 and 26. Before that, we started out in a windowless “illegal” basement apartment on the Southwest Side of Chicago, and later upgraded to an apartment on Archer Avenue facing the alley. Thanks to a housing boom, we made a nice profit and bought a larger home two years later in 1978 and eventually in 2013 purchased a 2-flat in Oak Park with our daughter and her family, where we live today.
I don’t consider Oak Park to be a starter neighborhood. Our property taxes are way too high to open ourselves to even a “perceived” reduced quality of living. If you purchase a single-family home on a block with multi-units, you knew they were there when you moved in. But to have them thrust on you after the fact is just not right.
Multi-family buildings are awesome for starting out. A 2-flat gives you the opportunity to buy a building and have tenants help pay the mortgage, with banks factoring that rental income into your potential loan amount. We should build 2-3 unit buildings on Roosevelt Road, North Avenue, and the Mohr site to open the door for homeownership. Buildings on busy streets should cost considerably less than in the middle of the neighborhood, offering perfect “starter” possibilities in an otherwise more “upscale” community.
We need to stop “studying” everything and just look at what works in Berwyn and Chicago regarding Roosevelt and North Avenue. Let’s not be so snobby about what type of businesses are good enough for us, and let’s match Berwyn & Chicago property tax rates on those streets. They’re our competition! Your potential tax bill should not be the deciding factor on which side of Roosevelt/North Avenue you locate your business.
Shirley Noah
Oak Park