Is demolition the solution? How about “Alien Infill”?

I only recently came upon the term “Alien Infill”. I’ve now added it to my old house vocabulary along with remuddling, architorture and garagescape. And like many things illustrations are helpful to clarify the concept.

Alien Infill #1: The first on on the left showing a suburban style ranch home with typical garage door prominence dropped into a neighborhood of significantly older and larger homes of a different scale, set back and I’d argue quality of materials and workmanship.

Alien Infill #2: The second on the right showing some effort to match the predominant two story style and set back however the scale is so radically smaller it too is jarring, looks misplaced and I’d say makes more permanent a downgrading of property values.

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Old house demolition – a short sighted solution.

It would seem that the demolition of old homes is often the solution to issues of owner abandoned or neglected homes. This is what appears to be happening. The home owner fails to maintain what had once been a fine home. Maintenance is deferred or so it would seem, in the interest of maximizing rental ROI. Code violations and their fines seem to be ignored preferring to have these default to property tax liens. Eventually the home is no longer habitable or rentable leading to virtual abandonment by the absentee home owner. The solution proposed then is demolition.

For a community that prides itself in being “Green” demolition of an existing house to then build another house in it’s place is among the least green things a community can do.

The problem is that many times the cost to rehab exceeds the appraised value in certain areas. So, why not just tear them down? Well, a more creative and environmentally sound way to deal with this issue is to mothball these houses. For less than the cost of demolition an abandoned house can be stabilized and held for future rehab. Patching the roof and painting the façade can work well toward this goal. ~Bob Yapp   bobyapp.com

This is a tough market for buying properties of any kind and choosing to demolish our existing housing stock at this time when the market is down when the same home could be rehabbed once the market turns around makes a permanent downgrade on the neighborhood because of a temporary market condition.

• If the solution is to demolish the problem property then what?
• Has there been thought as to what will happen following demolition?

Typically what happens is that some form of infill is plopped in. And while there are exceptions most of the best examples of appropriate infill were done many years ago. Virtually all the recent examples of infill are reminiscent of the alien infill illustrated above. The question is… What would maintain and advance property values more? Catching these homes before they’re allowed to degrade to where they are demolition risks? Or ending up with “alien infill”?

Appropriate infill housing is possible but difficult to cost justify which is why we end up with the smaller scale, cheaper construction infill commonly experienced.

Distressed properties and their owners need to be addressed by the city as our advocate before properties get to these conditions. We as neighbors need to take responsibility for being sure the city is aware of concerns around properties at risk of demolition by neglect.

More on the subject of “Abandoned Lots – What’s a community to do?” by Bob Yapp.