When I hear “original owner,” I usually expect a home that looks and feels its age. In 51 Carver, I was pleasantly surprised to find a house in very good condition.

The basics:

Asking Price: $700,000

Bedrooms: 4

Bathrooms: 3

Square Footage: 2,077

Lot Size: 4,750

$/Sq Ft: $337

Days on Market: 9

Property Type: Single Family Residence

Year Built: 1979

Community: Northwood – Shadow Run

There are no HOA dues or Mello Roos taxes.

I entered in the living room, where I was greeted with new laminate floors, cathedral ceilings and a large picture window that made the room surprisingly bright and airy (sadly, my photo doesn’t do it justice – it really was bright). The living room flows into the dining room, though the stairway in the middle provides a distinctly separate space. The dining room is also bright and offers enough space for a large table.

The kitchen is the part of the house that feels the oldest. It has original tile counters and dark brown cabinets, along with a tile floor and panel lighting in the ceiling. There are newer, white appliances. Everything is clean and well-maintained. While a remodel of the kitchen would certainly give it a more modern look and potentially open it up more to the family room, it is functional the way it is now.

The kitchen has a breakfast bar that overlooks the family room. With just a sliding door to the backyard and no other windows, I thought the room was pretty dark. It has a small wetbar and the same laminate flooring in the front rooms.

The last room downstairs is a bedroom. It has a small sliding closet and a fairly large window. It is adjacent to a bathroom with a small stall shower (no tub) and a single sink.

The backyard is a pretty average size for Northwood and is completely hardscaped. It has a storage shed in one corner that looks like a small house, so could possibly be cleaned out and used for another purpose.

Upstairs, there are three bedrooms. The master is at the top of the stairs. It isn’t a very large room, so it took me a minute to realize that it was the master. It has a huge window and slightly elevated ceilings. The bathroom is original, with two sinks and a separate tub and shower. More than anywhere else in the house, I felt that the master bathroom looked old and tired. The tub, which is just a standard bathtub, looked dingy and the shower is tucked into a small corner. This would be the first thing I remodeled if I bought this home. The master has a good-sized walk-in closet but needs some organizers installed.

The other two bedrooms upstairs share a bathroom which has a single sink and a shower/tub combo. One room is bigger than the other, with a large window and a small closet. The other room has two windows and a larger closet.

Downstairs, the ceilings have been scraped in all rooms except the living room; upstairs, none have been scraped. The laminate floors downstairs and carpet upstairs are new, and there are new six-panel internal doors throughout the house. All of the windows are original. While there is a lot to be done in this house to make it as nice and as modern as a brand new home, it is in remarkably good condition for a 1979 house.

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