Stylish home in trendy DC area sparks buyer confusion after hitting market with bargain $599,900 price tag
A brand new home has hit the market in a trendy DC area for just $599,900, and buyers are confused about the bargain price.
The house is built on a lot in the Shaw neighborhood of Washington, DC, which is known as one of the city’s hippest neighborhoods – with cool cocktail bars, beer gardens, vintage clothing boutiques and modern international restaurants.
Most homes in the area cost more than $1 million, while apartments average around $600,000 but can go as high as a million.
This is why buyers are shocked that a brand new home in the area hit the market for just under $600,000.
Contractor Nady Samnang first purchased the small lot at 1738 Glick Ct. NW with the intention of building a four-story, 15-foot-wide single-family home with his brother.
A brand new home has hit the market in a trendy DC area for just $599,900, and buyers are confused about the bargain price
The house is built on a lot in the Shaw neighborhood of Washington, DC, which is known as one of the city’s hippest neighborhoods – with cool cocktail bars, beer gardens, vintage clothing boutiques and modern international restaurants
The brothers who bought the plot of land to build a house on were hit with the shocking news that they could only build a house one and a half meters high
Samnang, the CEO of Virginia contractor Omnifics, said the plans were originally approved by the county, but the city made changes to zoning laws after groundbreaking had already begun.
The brothers received the shocking news that they could only build a house one and a half meters high.
“Without our knowledge, the city made changes to the zoning regulations after we purchased the property,” Samnang said. PEOPLE. “The zoning laws only allowed a six-foot blueprint of a house.”
“That’s when I talked to my brother and architect and said, ‘Hey, is this feasible? Or is it possible for someone to live?'” Samnang says.
More than a year and a half after the shocking news, the team had designed a blueprint for “the skinniest house in all of DC,” which measured 6 feet wide and 600 square feet.
The construction process was brutal according to Samnang, who said heavy equipment could not be driven onto the site because it was small.
All heavy equipment had to be marched directly to the site by hand and only two workers were allowed on the site at a time.
The large-looking but deceptively small bathroom has a large glass shower with a cobblestone floor and beautiful wooden finishes
“We have high-end cabinetry, quartz countertops and wall-to-wall porcelain tile in the bathroom. That was very important to us: if you’re going to build a very small house, it better be beautiful,” said the builder.
The skinny house has a lot of natural light through the large windows on either side and the modern finish makes the house look sleek and spacious
It has everything a homeowner could want, in a more compact form
By carefully thinking about how to make the most of the small space they had to work with, Samnang said the house feels larger than it actually is.
“We’ve still added bay windows to each living space, so even though the hallway is 6 feet wide, in the areas where people would live there’s 10 square feet of space,” he says.
“We have high-end cabinetry, quartz countertops and wall-to-wall porcelain tile in the bathroom. We thought that was very important: if you are going to build a very small house, it better be beautiful.’
The lean house has a lot of natural light through the large windows on both sides and the modern finish makes the house look sleek and spacious.
It has everything a homeowner could want, in a more compact form.
There is a fully fitted kitchen with all necessary appliances and breakfast bar style seating.
The bathroom has a large glass shower with a paved floor and beautiful wooden finishes.
In the bedroom, a large queen bed is comfortable and there is plenty of closet fitted into the sleek white walls.
Sarah Noel, an agent with Jennifer Young Homes – who is managing the listing, says the perfect buyer would be someone who doesn’t need a lot of space and appreciates the convenience of a smaller space in a sought-after area.
In the bedroom, a large queen bed is comfortable and there is plenty of closet fitted into the sleek white walls
Although the process of building the house was tedious and challenging, Samnang (the contractor) is proud of the finished product
Sarah Noel, an agent with Jennifer Young Homes – who is managing the listing, says the perfect buyer would be someone who doesn’t need a lot of space and appreciates the convenience of a smaller space in a sought-after area.
By carefully thinking about how to make the most of the small space they had to work with, Samnang said the house feels bigger than it actually is.
“Not everyone wants to keep a lot of square footage,” says Noel. “That and other factors like interest rates and lending are why you see the tiny house movement becoming so popular.”
‘The right buyer will be that city dweller; someone who doesn’t necessarily want a car since it’s one street away from a subway station. They don’t want condo fees or neighbors, and they don’t need a ton of space.”
Even though the process of building the house was tedious and challenging, Samnang is proud of the final product.
“We had a zero margin for error,” he says. ‘If we had done one thing wrong in the design, everything would have had to be done again. The greatest achievement is that we have used that space to transmit code, down to the centimeter.’
Although he is happy with the result, Samnang is in no rush to build the next tiny house. ‘The building itself was not fun at all. My contractors probably scolded me every week. It was a nightmare,” he said.