Sunset Heights Homes for Sale

Homes for Sale in Sunset Heights

In the past Sunset Heights homes had been mostly small bungalows. Rows of well maintained cottages and bungalows on nice sized lots. The image below is a renovated/expanded bungalow I sold a few  years ago. It remains one of my favorite Craftsman bungalows.

The area has changed a lot though in the last several of years since it has become popular with builders and new-home buyers. The new homes being build are generally on 25 ft wide lots. An example is below:

A post I wrote a couple of years ago describes this area as having a Split Personality.

See my recent post on New Vs Resale Prices and another post that compares home prices on Wide vs Narrow Lots. (My recent posts are just below this page)

Sunset Heights Location:

This area is in the north part of the Heights. It straddles N Main, between Yale and Airline, from 23rd St., up to the 610 loop. See my Interactive Heights Map to see how it fits within the Heights.

Changes: In years past Sunset Heights wasn’t as desirable as other parts of the Heights, so new construction just wasn’t built here. This has now changed drastically. Over the last half dozen years Sunset Heights had become one of the few affordable areas left. Construction has been booming for quite a while now. and land prices have escalated.

Another change is that there isn’t a “wrong side” of N Main anymore. Just a few years ago a house east of N Main would sell for less, and take a lot longer to sell than one on the west side. Now, prices are the same. Appraisals on homes sold the east side of N Main had always worried me…not anymore.

Two lLinks for Sunset Heights MLS Search:

MLS Search for New Sunset Heights Homes

MLS Search for Sunset Heights Resale Homes

This search will show homes priced from lot-value (most likely to be sold to builders) to remodeled homes, to homes built a few years ago.

Sunset Heights has a strong Civic Association. They are always on guard about builders trying to change the nature of the neighborhood. Given the opportunity, townhouses would be packed into every corner of the neighborhood. “Protect our Neighborhood” signs were everywhere for a while. This has paid off; for the most parts developers have built nice homes in the area.

This area has always had a strong sense of identity. The Galveston Daily News back on 1/20/1911 had a story about Sunset Heights fighting the annexation by the city of Houston Heights (before the city of Heights was annexed by Houston). A quote: Mass meetings are being held almost nightly by citizens of Chaney ville, Brunner and Sunset Heights to protest against the threatened territorial invasion of Houston Heights whose plan to benevolently or otherwise assimilate the adjoining communities attracting much attention.

History:

Sunset Heights has an interesting history. Richard Rogers, who made his money in Houston hotels and developed the Rogers Addition of Woodland Heights, bought a 100 acres of land from the Texas Central Railroad for $18,7500. (I love to quote prices from long ago. It sounds so cheap, but was very difficult to get). This comes out to be ~$13 per 3000 SF lot. The original plat was filed on 09/08/1910.

I had always wondered why the lot size was 3000 SF, but homes were built on multiple lots. I.e. homes in the heights lots are typically 6600 SF; Woodland Heights Homes are 5000 SF; whereas Sunset Heights homes are typically built on 2 lots of 3000 SF. It turns out the developer was not sure about the economy. He didn’t know if most buyers could afford a 6000 SF lot. So, he left his options open. If the economy stayed good, he would sell 2 or 3 lots for a homesite. If the economy went bad, he could sell them individually. It turns out most of the sales were double lots. The exception was the part on 29th St, next to Independence Heights (before being split when the 610 loop was built) many of this were sold as single lots.

This double lot (2 lots each 3000 SF)  has made it ideal for builders who wanted smaller lots. They could buy a poorly maintained house on a double lot; demo it, then put up two houses. They didn’t have to worry about the cost or uncertainty of re-platting into smaller lots; they were already platted that way.

The name of Sunset Realty Company, and Sunset Heights was quirky too. Sunset was just a very popular name at the time. Even trains were called Sunset Limited, Sunset Express. etc.

So, you now know a little bit about this corner of the Heights.

See my recent post on Home Prices in Sunset Heights and other posts below.