A condemned Fremont, California home with holes in the roof and mildew in the pipes sold for $1.23 million, a price that highlights skyrocketing home prices fueled by a housing shortage in the Bay Area.
Listing agent Larry Gallegos said Wednesday that he received three cash offers after listing the home in January for $1 million. The three-bedroom, two-bath house closed $230,000 over the asking price on March 30, Gallegos said.
"There are so many 20-year-old millionaires in the area that it really didn't surprise me," he said.
Two investors bought the house with plans to tear it down and build a 4,000 square-foot, "completely green" home they hope to put in the market within five months, Gallegos said.
He said the buyers didn't even enter the house because they had no interest in the actual building but were sold on its location, which could offer a view of the San Francisco Bay from a second story. Online property records show its assessment is years out of date — its taxable value is listed as $90,000.
Gallegos, 64, said his father bought a home in Fremont, 35 miles south of San Francisco, in the late 1950s for $13,000. "Times have changed, but real estate is still a good investment," he said.
The median home price in Fremont, which connects to Silicon Valley through several highways and with easy access to San Francisco and Oakland by train, is $1 million as of late February, according to Zillow.com. That compares to $1.3 million in San Francisco and $1.28 million in Berkeley.
The owner of a burned-out house in nearby San Jose listed the property last week for $800,000. Holly Barr, the real estate agent selling that house, told the Mercury News that the price is standard for the desirable location.
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