Sylvan Park Neighborhood Nashville (Germantown, Waverly: real estate, power lines, renter)

[luke12]

Active empty nesters in early 60's planning and exploring for long term future retirement relocation. Any local info as to how well the Sylvan Park area would be as a possibility would be greatly appreciated. Interested in a single family home ~ 1800 sq feet. One level living preferred. Would like to be as close to McCabe park as possible.

Thanks

[KevinPellatiro-Franklin]

Sylvan Park keeps getting better and better as far as community options or neighborhood offerings. Since you have some time, if you can spend a few mornings at Star Bagel or visit during the July 4th festivities, or walk the streets in late Spring, you'll meet a ton of your prospective neighbors. You might try and talk to the folks at Sylvan Park Neighborhood Association | Nashville, Tenn. to see if they might allow you to join the neighborhood Facebook group too?

[yank283]

Sylvan Park is a great neighborhood. I used to live right by McCabe Park and loved it. Finding a one level house in the neighborhood might prove extremely difficult though. I don't think you'll find a lot of one story houses. The one's you will find will probably be original cottage stye post-war buids with a lot less square feet than you are looking for. And all the new builds are definitly going to be two stories. There might be the occasional odd ranch style house stuck in there somewhere, but I would have to guess not many of them.

[yank283]

On a similar note, you might want to check out the Rosebank neighborhood in East Nashville. Plenty of one story ranch houses that would fit your criteria. Near a lot of new shops and restaurants (Silly Goose, Eastland Cafe, Ugly Mugs, New Climb Nashville, Cumberland Transit...etc) and also right by Shelby Park and they are getting ready to convert a former small airport (Cornelia Fort) to green space and that runs right along Rosebank.

[N.Cal]

What is your budget?

[luke12]

Thanks to all. Toured the neighborhood and met some great people. Understand that the location is driving the market prices. That appears to be the only value I can see. The housing stock and in-consistant curb appeal from house to house ( great house next to or across the street from a eye sore ) does not in my mind justify the prices that sellers are asking for some of the homes we looked at. The power lines and non-sidewalks or curbing in some sections was also disappointing. Appears to be way over priced. However , what the market will bear. If Buyers continue to pay what Sellers are asking , more power to them.
Thanks again for your input. Appreciate it.

[ariesjow]

^ I totally understand what you mean about Sylvan Park. Although I really like that area, I also feel it's somewhat overpriced and hope the city decides to add more sidewalks to the street grid there. It could use it, but I wonder if the residents there would support more sidewalks.

If the sidewalks are important to you, then you may want to spend some time exploring other areas like Germantown, Lockeland Springs and Eastwood Neighbors. These areas are getting pretty pricey, but residential areas of East and North Nashville have much better networks of sidewalks than the west side, IMO.

[yank283]

It's definitely about location. I said I loved the area, that was as a renter back in the day taking in the (at least then) great vibe and neighbors we had. I just saw a new build on Westlawn for $700,000+. Crazy. Yeah, there are really only sidewalks on the main roads. Rosebank (or Inglewood) doesn't really have sidewalks either except on the main/heavier traveled roads.

Not sure where your coming from, but finding a historic/older neighborhood that's walkable to parks/restaurants with plenty of sidewalks and that doesn't have mixed housing (former teardowns with duplexes erected circa 1970's or so) near is about impossible in Nashville unfortunately.

[nashvols]

Luke -- I can certainly understand where you're coming from...and I agree with the points made by aries and yank.

If you are looking for a charming urban and/or historic neighborhood in Nashville, your options are pretty limited. The neighborhoods that are the most intact, and most gentrified are very expensive. These would be neighborhoods like Richland, Whitland, Hillsboro/West End, Belmont/Hillsboro (all in the same general cluster on the southwest side of town).

Those neighborhoods never sank to the lows that most other urban single family neighborhoods in Nashville reached, so they kept a lot of the housing stock intact, and remained at least somewhat desirable throughout their existence.

While I would say Sylvan Park was never in the 'ghetto', the scene wasn't very pretty 20-30 years ago. You would be amazed by the progress made in the last 10 years alone. The same can be said about many of the now desirable neighborhoods in East Nashville, as well as Germantown, 12th South, and Historic Waverly.

When these neighborhoods started to sink, some houses were lost, and most of those that replaced them were small, nondescript four wall ranch houses and duplexes....because in that day, who would want to move into an old decrepit house built in the early 1900s? Probably the same way many people think of houses from the 60s-80s today.

There were also cases where cheap land was snatched up for commercial and industrial purposes. Some of these eyesores remain to this day.


I'm not a real estate agent (trust me), but if I were, I wouldn't be selling you the 'right now' in Nashville's urban neighborhoods. I'd be selling you the future potential. I'd be selling you the fact that most houses in these neighborhoods have increased, or at least been stable, even in the tough economy. I'd be selling you the fact that those eyesores will eventually go away because the market forces will demand it.


But I understand that if you are scouting a location for retirement, you'd probably rather be sold on the present rather than the future.

Are Richland and Cherokee Park out of your $ range?

[luke12]

I'm afraid so. We actually want to be in the low $ 300 K's. Does not go far in these neighborhoods.

Thanks