Coon Rapids holds open house for Dogwood, 109th Avenue house projects
by Peter Bodley
Managing editor
Residents got their first look Sunday at two more vacant/foreclosed houses acquired by the Coon Rapids Housing and Redevelopment Authority (HRA) for the city’s Home for Generations program.
The pre-construction open houses took place at a 1962 split-level home at 10911 Dogwood St. N.W., which had been vacant since June 2010, and was purchased for $100,000, as well as at an Orrin Thompson 1.5-story home built in 1959 at 537 109th Ave. N.W. which had a $93,664 price tag.
Remodeling plans were on display at both homes and representatives from the contractors hired by the HRA – Lennox Builders at the 109th Avenue property and Dercon Construction Services Inc. at the Dogwood Street address – along with city officials and realtors retained by the HRA – Michael Hunstad on 109th Avenue and Darbi Camparetto at Dogwood – were on hand to describe the work that was to take place.
Residents will get the opportunity to see how the remodeling projects are progressing with open houses at both locations during construction, probably in March to tie in with the North Suburban Home Improvement Show in Andover March 19, according to Kristin DeGrande, city neighborhood coordinator.
The post-construction open houses will be scheduled once the work has been completed in May.
Through the open houses, members of the community can see how older homes can be updated to meet contemporary needs, DeGrande said.
There were some 200 people at each of the open houses Sunday, she said.
“We were very pleased by the turn-out and the very favorable response to what is being planned for these houses,” DeGrande said.
Under the Home for Generations program the HRA, comprising the seven members of the Coon Rapids City Council, purchases vacant homes in the city that are either in foreclosure or about to go into foreclosure.
Once they have been remodeled, the homes will be put on the market for sale with the HRA’s goal of recouping the costs of both the purchase price and remodeling.
At the home on Dogwood Street, there will be an addition with shakes built on to the front entry way, DeGrande said.
This will be done to make the house more attractive to look at from the street, she said.
“Right now, it looks like a two-story box,” DeGrande said.
In addition, natural stone will be added to the bottom four feet of the house in the front to “increase its curb-appeal vision,” she said.
An interior wall will be taken down to open up the inside of the house, DeGrande said.
“It will create a bigger sense of space,” she said.
The house currently has two driveways with a side entrance to the house from the driveway on the opposite side from the garage, DeGrande said.
Renovation work will include closing off that side entrance and creating an entrance from the garage into a mud room, she said.
But proposed improvements to the basement might have to be left to the new owner of the home because of budget constraints, according to DeGrande.
That’s because the real estate market is still at such a low ebb that high remodeling costs could price the home out of the market when the HRA gets ready to sell it, DeGrande said.
This will be the first Home for Generations project undertaken by Dercon Construction Services, Blaine.
But, according to Dean Marquette, owner, his company has totally rehabilitated three homes acquired by Anoka County through its federally-funded Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP).
The most recent in Anoka had to be completely gutted, Marcotte said.
Marcotte is excited to be part of the Coon Rapids Home for Generations program, he said.
Jim and Stephanie Masteller and their daughter Rebecca, who live in the area of Mercy Hospital, wanted to see the HRA’s plans for remodeling the two homes.
They had been to the open house after the second Home for Generations project was completed at a Crooked Lake Boulevard home and from that visit, got the idea for replacing their furnace, according to Stephanie Masteller.
“We are interested in remodeling plans on a smaller scale,” Stephanie Masteller said.
Chris and Michelle Elliott had a personal interest in taking a look at the remodeling plans for the Dogwood Street home because they live in a house in the neighborhood with exactly the same floor plan.
They were particularly interested by the plan to take out a wall to open up the inside of the home, the Elliotts said.
Lennox Builders, Mounds View, which remodeled the first two houses in the Home for Generations program, will renovate the home on 109th Avenue.
According to Sean Lennox, this will be a completely sustainable “recycle, reuse, renew” project with all building materials repurposed, reused or renewed.
For example, a solar panel will be placed on the roof of the garage and there will be dual-flush toilets, DeGrande said.
While no additions are planned to the 109th Avenue home, cantilevers will be used to expand the kitchen area without the need to put in footings or expand the foundation, she said.
In addition, some dormers are planned on the second floor, DeGrande said.
Besides the cantilevers, a peninsula will be added to the renovated kitchen design, Lennox said.
And outside extensive landscaping is proposed, he said.
A feature of that will be the use of rain barrels to capture the runoff from the gutters with that water being used to irrigate the yard, Lennox said.
Work is expected to start on the project next week with interior demolition, he said.
According to Marcell Zurn, while his wife wanted to attend the open house at the 109th Avenue property, he had a special interest as a retired construction worker.
The solar panel displayed at the open house that will be placed on the roof of the garage caught his eye, Zurn said.
Dercon and Lennox were chosen from 21 companies that responded to a city request for proposals (RFP) sent out to 45 local contractors.
The city has paid for the purchase of the two properties through its HRA budget.
The first home purchased through the Home for Generations program was a 1950s rambler on the 11600 block of Juniper Street N.W. The remodeled home was sold in the summer of 2009.
Remodeling work on the second home, a 1970s split-level on the 12900 block of Crooked Lake Boulevard, was completed last summer and the house was put on the market in August.
The house has not yet been sold and the price has been lowered by $5,000 to $194,400, according to DeGrande.
Peter Bodley is at peter.bodley@ecm-inc.com
