The blocks of Fairmount Avenue closest to the Art Museum have been developed for some time, but property owners are continuing to maintain and improve their buildings. At 2413 Fairmount Ave., a duplex is currently undergoing some minor exterior renovations.
If you look at the sales data for some other properties on the block, you can see how values have jumped in the last fifteen years as quickly as children grow. The triplex at 2411 Fairmount Ave. was sold for $200K back in 2001. The next year, 2413 Fairmount Ave. sold for $339K. By 2006 it changed hands for $545K. It’s safe to assume that the building received some TLC in the intervening year which contributed to some of the price jump, but the increase also speaks to the dramatic appreciation that took place in many Philadelphia neighborhoods during those years. Today, properties along the 2400 block of Fairmount Ave. are even more valuable- and renovations like those taking place on the property pictured above only serve to further increase those property values.
Development in Fairmount isn't terribly common at this point, but we've seen a few projects come through the pipeline of late. Just around the corner at 24th & Aspen, a structure that years ago featured a ground-floor commercial space was recently redeveloped into a purely residential building. A few blocks south at 23rd & Brandywine, there were four new townhomes built on a long-vacant lot last summer.
While we were on this block we got to thinking again about 2337-39 Pennsylvania Ave., two vacant lots even closer to the Art Museum, right off the Parkway. As we told you previously, the owner has owned those two vacant lots, as well as the bungalow looking building next door, since 1973. This is seriously prime property. Consider the view that homes here would command of the Parkway and Art Museum and the city at night, and parlay that with the mega $140M Whole Foods mixed-use project coming a few blocks away that will bring 293-units, and these lots become even tastier.