I may be biased; I was raised in the Indian Village in Ossining and I love pre war buildings, so I totally agree with Westchester Magazine’s selection of Ossining as the best place in the county for architecture admirers. Ossining has some absolutely beautiful structures, both buildings downtown and homes around the town. I have posted previously about the stunning beauty of Ossining’s churches as well.
I have sold homes all over the county. Pelham is fantastic for Tudors. Bedford had some amazing contemporaries, and estates to die for. Peekskill has some great Victorians. Bronxville has a downtown that is iconic. There is phenomenal architecture all around. But for one town, Ossining does indeed take the prize in my opinion as well.
In between appointments today I brought my camera and took a few shots to illustrate why they made the right selection.
This is the Mundet Mansion on Osage Drive in the Indian Village. I grew up across the street. It is now an apartment building and has been restored gloriously since being bought in the 1970s.
Downtown. The Bank for Saving has an ornate copper trim that gives it a regal aura.The spires of the First Baptist Church are in the background.
Upper Main Street, Ossining. The buildings were rundown when I was a kid in the 1970s. Virtually all have been renovated and renewed in the past 10 years. The architecture and design have been preserved.
This is a classic Mansard roof. Ossining has quite a few of these beauties, and many homeowners dote on their treasures, painting the trim in flattering fashion. I love the design of the multi colored scallop roof tile on this one.
The judge’s house on Belleview Avenue. I listed and sold this gorgeous home in 2006. The home was built by a judge in the 1920’s with stones from the shore of the Hudson. It was the village speakeasy, and the tavern remained in the basement for over 70 years. I get a kick out of the fact that the judge ran a speakeasy. Peter Faulk of TV fame grew up a few blocks from this home on Prospect Avenue.
A picturesque Tudor on Browning Drive, a street with its share of lovely homes.
Maryknoll Mission. Built in the 1920s, it has been the home to one of the world’s largest Catholic foreign missions in the world. The entire campus, half of which is in the town of Ossining on the New Castle border, is all stone and appealing. But the jewel on the crown is the main building, modeled as an Asian Pagoda.
See what I mean? I live 5 minutes from every structure in this article. And they are all more beautiful in person. Take a drive over and see for yourself. While you’re here, get some espresso at Tuscan Grille or some sushi at Okinawa Hibachi. You’ll thank me.
No Officer, Despite What Zillow Says, it is Not My Listing
Full disclosure: I am a Zillow customer, as well as a paying customer to Trulia and Realtor.com.
Our office received a phone call from the town of Kent Police yesterday to inform us that there was some undesirable activity at my listing. Of course, the only problem with that- aside from youths partying at a vacant house in town- is that the listing isn’t mine. It was listed by one of my agents and expired 2 years ago. But, hey, it said it was my listing on the Internet, so they reached out to me as the broker to see if I could secure the property. I cannot; my firm has not had any authority to market the property since 2010. Despite what the Internet says, I cannot help.
Now, I can sort of hear what some of my friends at Zillow might say: “Hey! sell her a house!”
Um, no.
When a cop or a building department official calls me about a problem with a property, they are about as likely a prospect as the person behind the counter at DMV when I am renewing my license. They are at work and have a problem to solve. They don’t want to get pitched, and it wouldn’t be terribly responsible to try either. They are cops and code enforcers. They are on the clock. As a tax payer I wouldn’t want them listening to an agent pitch anymore than I’d want them perusing an Avon catalog.
It isn’t just a Zillow issue, as other aggregators have all kinds of accuracy issues. Yet because Zillow has risen so high in search engine results, they bear the brunt of the issue. Does that mean I should give them a break? No.
To Zillow I would say, with great power comes great responsibility. I don’t want to hear “Phil, all you need to do is log on to Zillow, edit your listing and …” because the problem is not that I am neglecting my own listings. The property in Peekskill was not my listing. The house in Kent was not indicated as being for sale, but the public doesn’t always see status of the listing clearly on these sites.
There is a lot that I am leaving out of this post. I won’t go into all the rude calls I get from frustrated people screaming “don’t you know your own listing?” into my ear over a home I never saw where I am listed as a contact. I won’t go into the odyssey I had with a utility company over an old listing I had that was now vacant and abandoned.
The controversy and tension between Zillow and the brokerage community, well documented elsewhere, is one reason why I am sure they are hiring well regarded people like Jay Thompson as the outreach guy to brokers like myself. That is all well and good, but right now there is a data problem that has to be fixed, and I am tired of PR-spun answers. It would be refreshing to get some accountability that does not involved me logging onto their site and doing free work to solve their data problems.