Red Coat Lane contract

18 Red Coat, dropped to $1.995 million from an opening price of $2.695 back in May '17.  I always caution clients not to calculate value from original asking prices but in this case, when I scouted it with the Mickster a couple of weeks ago and wandered from room to room, I kept asking him, "why hasn't this sold?"  At just under $2, this was a bargain.

Our own clients felt it was too large a house for them (5,300 sq. ft.), which is of course an entirely understandable and legitimate reason to reject a house, and I do wish the sellers hadn't added on a two-bedroom wing – I assume it was to accommodate a parent — but you can't match this house at this price in mid country. 

The kitchen has dark cabinets, but so what? Change the doors — the cases are top quality, as are the appliances: Viking, Bosch, etc., and the layout is perfect, including a stone patio, with natural gas grill, just outside. There's a  walk-out basement that's got great light, and upstairs, the rooms are well sized and well placed.

It certainly isn't the perfect house, but in this price range, it's a damn good deal, and congratulations to the buyers and their agent for grabbing it. 

Readers, snark away, but this house offered exceptional value in this price range. It won't go down in the annals of great architecture, but given what's available in Greenwich in the $1.5 — $2.0 range, this was a good buy.

Not a purchase I'd have recommended, but what do I know?

It went nowhere, fast, and is bound to sit for a while more

After eight years of being kicked around by the market, 30 Oneida Drive has sold for $3.8 million. It started at $6 million in 2010, which was silly, but even $3.8 seems high, to me. It's a 1.4 acre waterfront lot in the R-20 zone, though, so if the buyer can chop it into two building lots and gain permission to build two new houses where this wreck now stands, it could make sense. Given the neighbors around here, and our P&Z, the new owner is going to need deep pockets and a load of patience before he sees the fruit of his labors.

Lucky students at Hamilton Avenue

John Grasso

John Grasso, who has been serving as interim principal at Ham-Ave since last July, has agreed to serve for one more year.

Mr. Grasso was, first, Assistant Principal, and then Principal at Riverside for almost two decades, and did a terrific job there. He retired in 2012, and I'd thought he was lost to the town, so it's great that he's come back.

Pal Nancy worked closely with him when she served as President of the Riverside PTA and praised him to the skies [changed from "sky" — I'm not sure why "skies" is the proper phrase, but it is], and my children adored him.

Couldn't find a better man.

If I were a cop, I'd just stop responding to these calls

Mr. Saheed Vassell greets his neighbors

Cops shoot another "unarmed" black man, community blasts them,

A man terrorizing people on the streets in Brooklyn with what appeared to be a firearm was fatally shot by cops — who later determined the weapon was not a gun but a metal pipe.

Saheed Vassell, 34 — whose family said he suffered from bi-polar disorder — was brandishing the curved metal pipe and pointing it at people at a bus stop at Utica Avenue and Empire Boulevard in Crown Heights at 4:40 p.m., according to police.

Three witnesses called 911 to report that a man wearing a brown jacket was pointing “what was described as a silver firearm at people on the street.”

Surveillance footage from a Utica Avenue store shows Vassell pointing the pipe like a firearm at a person who is walking into a store.

One 911 caller followed Vassell’s movements as he was walking along Montgomery Street while continuing to point the “weapon,” police sources said.

At Utica Avenue, Vassell “took a two-handed shooting stance” and aimed the metal pipe directly at arriving officers, according to NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan.

Four cops, three in plainclothes and one in uniform, then fired a total of 10 shots, striking Vassell several times.

Monahan stressed that the officers were responding not to a call of a disturbed person — which might have been handled differently.

“This was a call of a man that 911 callers felt was pointing a gun at people on the street. When we encounter him, he turns with what appears to be a gun at the officers.”

The man’s father, Eric Vassell, said his son suffered from bipolar disorder and drank but was “never a bad person.”

The dad said cops could have handled the situation differently.

“There must be a way to save this person than to kill them,” he said. “Aren’t the police trained how to defend [themselves] and prevent killing a mental person?”

Vassell was rushed to a hospital, where he died.

Afterward, people gathered to decry to police-involved shooting.

“They didn’t try to help him!” a woman yelled. “That wasn’t CPR!”

But police said officers immediately rendered aid to Vassell and called an ambulance.

A man wearing a 67th Precinct clergy-council crisis-team jacket tried to calm a woman at the scene who was visibly upset.

“They don’t want to bridge the gap between us, they want to kill us,” the woman said.

The Daily News, naturally, has already condemned this as yet another example of racist cops killing an innocent black man: 

Let us not be so surprised that cops could shoot to death another black man without a gun on the same day — in the same hour — that we were paying tribute to the man [MLK] , the very soul who personified nonviolence.

 I'm sure Al Sharpton will be on the scene before the day is done.

Home invader stabbed to death by 78-year-old defending his wife. Guess who the Brits have arrested for murder?

NAZI BOMBS? NO THANK YOU, WE'RE BRITISH: WE'LL DO IT OURSELVES

Aw come on, you peeked.  

From the country that ignored for decades a ring of Pakistani men running a child (6-12) rape shop, for fear of offending racial sensibilities, that's cut its police force so severely that it no longer has sufficient numbers to investigate burglaries and rapes, and that releases murderers serving "life sentences" after seven years in prison, this:

'He was protecting his dementia-stricken wife': Neighbours defend OAP, 78, who 'stabbed armed burglar, 38, to death' as he is bailed after two nights in the cells and police search drains for clues

A pensioner arrested on suspicion of murder after he fatally wounded an armed burglar who broke into his home has been bailed.

Richard Osborn-Brooks, 78, is at the centre of a case which has reignited the debate about the rights of homeowners to defend themselves from intruders.

He has now been released from a police station near his home in Hither Green, south-east London pending an investigation by murder detectives. Police have ordered him to return on a date in early May.

The pensioner was marched into the kitchen of their suburban £500,000 home by one man carrying a screwdriver, while his accomplice went upstairs to ransack the property as his wife Maureen, 76, who is said to have dementia, lay defenceless and terrified.

A struggle ensued in the kitchen and the 38-year-old intruder was stabbed in the chest as Mr Osborn-Brooks grappled with him in an apparent attempt to take the weapon and protect himself and his wife. 

Bleeding heavily, the robber then tried to flee. But he collapsed in a pool of blood after staggering 250 yards from the front door of the end-of-terrace property in Hither Green, South-East London. 

The second burglar, who police say was also armed, fled in a van, leaving his accomplice for dead after trying unsuccessfully to bundle him into the getaway vehicle.

Friend Tony Guest wrote online: 'So this is British justice is it? Where is our protection? The old man deserves a medal and to be let free. Now you know why America has guns.'
 

Entire governing board of National Association for the Advancement of Colored People resigns after it's revealed that they've been referring to members as "colored people" instead of "people of color"

At least I expect them to, after a DNC leader was forced out of that group for committing the same sin.

DNC Member Who Called Blacks ‘Colored People’ Resigns

Florida Democratic National Committee member John Parker resigned on Wednesday amidst a wave of calls for him to step down.

Parker, also the state committeeman for the Duval County Democratic Party, announced he was stepping down, effective immediately, in a letter sent to DNC chair Tom Perez, Florida Democratic Party chair Terrie Rizzo, and Duval County Democratic Executive Committee chair Lisa King.

"It is with deep regret that I offer my resignation, effective immediately, as the State Committeeman of the Duval County Democratic Party and as a member of the Democratic National Committee," Parker wrote. "The past several weeks have been a challenging time as mistakes and a misstatement I made, and apologized for, have been misunderstood and give the impression I am something I am not."

The current political climate reminds me of the French Revolution, and Mao's mob rule during the Cultural Revolution, but if we can manage to push back and contain the hysteria within the Democrat Party itself, and only the Democratic Party, I'm all for it.

Now here's a smart price reduction

7 Dewart Road dropped its price today from $7.950 million to $6.995. That may still not be the right price: the market, not this silly scribe dictates that, but it drives me crazy, and I complain about it here frequently, when owners delay the inevitable by nibbling away at their asking price in small bites, rather than just going directly to the next landing area. Go big or stay home, literally.

But in fact, if I owned 7 Dewart I would stay home, gladly. This looks like an incredibly comfortable home to live and entertain in, and Dewart's a great street, close enough to town to be convenient, yet just south enough of the Parkway to escape its noise.

If I weren't single, with grown children, I'd be envious.

Pending off Stanwich

42 Dublin Hill Road (which is that lane on the right off Stanwich, not "Doubling", just up on the left), asking $7.750 million. Nice old 1928 house, but the attraction here, which explains the price, is the it's 23.6 acres in the R-2 Zone. I'm sure you can't carve out eleven lots from this property, but there's certainly room here for more than just this one. It'd be nice if the developer restored the existing house as well, but I have no knowledge of what's planned.

Contract in Old Greenwich

8 Gisborne Place, $2.295 million, twenty-two days. Gisborne's a small cul du sac with what, 4? houses on it, off of Tomac and adjoining Innis Arden. No traffic, close to town. There are a couple of these 1980 houses there, and the price for this one seems spot-on. That's not just my opinion, obviously, because at least one buyer agree.

I predict (several) price cuts in this home's future

The house that dares not show its face

17 Sabine Farms Road is new to the market today, priced at $8.1 million. The sellers purchased this for $8.2 back in 2005, after it had been marked down from $10, and despite money put into it since then, I'm pretty sure that their disappointment at not recovering at least that purchase price will continue to grow over the years.

Possibly a good indication of what's wrong with this house, aside from it being just another iteration of the boring Greenwich mega-mansion architecture circa 2002, is that almost half of the listing photographs are devoted to the basement amenities. I mean, really? The best features of a house are the kid's drum-practice room, an unused wine cellar, and an exercise room designed by Dr. Mengele for the comfort of his guests? 

Hang on to your wallet on this one, and wait for it to ripen.

the doctor will see you now

what price, genius?

I'd call this the "WTF Wall", but then I identified it

Poor Hans Solo. But at least he didn't end up in Greenwich