Amber Helm’s grandparents built the house at the tip of Crown Point nearly a half-century ago, on a coveted, blufftop spot along the Pacific Ocean.
“She heard the seals going, she looked around, she put up her hands and said, ‘This is it,’ ” Amber said of her grandmother, June Helm.
While the setting still makes the house – with private stairs to a cove – a standout property, its 1968 vintage means it’s ripe for a major revamp. But this is no handyman’s special. The three-bedroom house is listed at $14.9 million.
Southern California has seen a surge in pricey houses on the market with phrases such as “fixer upper,” “TLC,” “needs work” or “good bones,” an analysis by real estate website Zillow shows.
Expensive fixer-uppers, or those listed in the top third of their markets, saw the biggest increase in the number of as-is homes for sale around the nation over the last five years, going up 35 percent. By contrast, fixer-uppers in the bottom third of the market rose less than 3 percent.
“Rising home prices and tough buyer competition may be giving sellers more flexibility to list their home for sale ‘as-is’ without needing to fix it up first,” the report states.
Cheap fixers had their heyday when the housing market crashed, Skylar Olsen, senior economist at Zillow, said in an interview last week.
“The new fixer-upper,” she said, “is a million-dollar teardown.”
‘In the driver’s seat’
In the L.A.-Orange County metropolitan area, listings generally were down 21 percent from 2011 to 2015, while fixer-uppers of all price ranges had a dip of 17 percent, the Zillow study showed. But high-end fixers – starting at $780,100 and going up, or way up – climbed by nearly 42 percent.
Nationwide, a greater increase in the number of expensive fixers over low- and mid-tier ones also was seen in places as diverse as Washington, D.C.; Portland, Ore.; Houston; Austin, Texas; and Nashville, Tenn. Definitions of low-, mid- and high-end homes differ by area.
Overall, fixers for sale have gone up 12 percent from five years ago, according to the analysis, which reviewed 452 metropolitan areas covering about 80 percent of the population.
“Across the country, homes are selling fast and for high prices,” said Svenja Gudell, Zillow’s chief economist, in a statement. “Sellers are in the driver’s seat, with the freedom to list their home for sale ‘as-is’ without worrying about price cuts or the home sitting on the market.”
Another way to look at it: “You don’t have to bet on the fact that that kitchen remodel is going to pay off in the end,” Olsen said. “You can just sell your home.”
Trophy estates
Helm, 42, renovates houses, but said she doesn’t have the time or money to invest in an extensive remodel on the Crown Point home. So it landed on the Multiple Listing Service, where, as of last week, it was the 22nd priciest house for sale in Laguna Beach.
“It’s a jewel,” Helm said, giving a visitor a tour of the property recently. “You have your private beach, and obviously, you have this amazing view.”
The 3,121-square-foot house is a mix of Spanish and midcentury modern influences. It includes a bar that her grandfather, who didn’t drink, fashioned into an ice cream parlor.
A set of architect’s renderings referred to in the listing are meant to help a buyer envision the future.
“This property affords the opportunity to create your very own legacy and trophy estate,” wrote the agent, Leo Goldschwartz of The McMonigle Team.
“As-is” properties in Orange County that have seen noteworthy transformations in recent years include a home on Linda Isle in Newport Beach that was featured in Architectural Digest in the 1970s.
In 2013, an investor bought the house for $9.5 million, complete with its dark, heavy beams and a wooden, cantilevered stairway leading to empty spaces with worn carpeting and bulky, dated accents.
After an extreme revamp, the four-bedroom home boasts high ceilings, an open floor plan, formal dining room, island kitchen and an elevator, along with hardwood and travertine floors and fireplaces in the living room and master suite.
Outside, a terrace along the water spans the width of the property, and a dock can accommodate a 60-foot boat.
A heated swimming pool and spa are tucked into a front courtyard.
Opportunity knocks
The fixer-upper trend also can be seen in various neighborhoods, where construction sites and new listings have been changing the landscape.
Three years ago, for example, investors paid $1 million for a 534-square-foot home built in the 1930s on the Balboa Peninsula about a block from the beach.
The house, appearing in a Register story about what $1 million buys around Southern California, has since been rebuilt.
In its place is a 3,022-square-foot house that recently hit the market at $3.195 million. The four-bedroom, Bali-style house has an open floor plan and a gourmet kitchen with an island that includes barstool seating, an espresso coffee maker and a wine fridge. Accordion sliding doors open to an outdoor patio.
The house is one of several homes on the peninsula that have replaced teardowns in recent years and hit the market at more than $3 million.
Driving around the Westcliff/Dover Shores area in Newport Beach on a November morning, real estate agent Jeff Stokes of HOM Sotheby’s International Realty pointed out homes in various stages of reconstruction.
“Everybody wants to make money in real estate,” he said. “Real estate flipping shows make it look easy to buy fixer-uppers, fix and sell them quickly for large profits, especially in today’s rising market.”
In high-demand areas like Westcliff/Dover Shores, three types of buyers compete for as-is homes, Stokes said: Flippers who want to fix them quickly and resell; builders who want to tear them down and replace them with larger, modern homes; and owner-users looking for a place to live.
“They are usually families … in it for the long haul,” he said. “Owner-users will pay generally more than the flippers and builders.”
Stokes and agent Timothy Carr of Villa Real Estate have listed a new, five-bedroom, 3,999-square-foot house in the neighborhood. The home has two-story ceilings, a 20-foot fireplace wall, a wine cellar designed to be part of the décor, oak plank flooring and sliding glass doors that create a disappearing wall to the outdoors.
It replaced a modest, three-bedroom, 1,965-square-foot house. “Well maintained but dated home situated on large lot on quiet street,” the listing read when a builder snatched up the house for $1.325 million a couple of years ago.
The price tag on the new house: $3.695 million.