Furnished house in Portland, Oregon (close-in, desirable Sellwood neighborhood) available for rent short-term August/September 2020 (my house!)
House is in the middle of being painted!
Picture from July 2020
We’re working on coordinating a Lead Safe Mama U.S. cross-country driving tour (socially distanced (as appropriate) speaking engagements, small community events, one-on-one consultations – all with PPE as necessary) for August and September 2020. To facilitate this tour (and help cover the costs) I am considering renting my house out for August and possibly also September (if we can find a potential renter [with good references!] interested in staying in our home during that time.)
Posted Saturday, June 6, 2020
If you know of any who might be interested in renting a house for the full month of August (likely available both August and September) in Portland, Oregon (30-day minimum) in the Sellwood neighborhood – please let me know! Beds for 8 people +.
Fun Features:
- The house is a 4-bedroom 1,700 sf home, but is currently set up as 3 bedrooms (3 rooms with beds) + an office (no bed!)
- 92 Walkscore. We have lived in this home for more than 13 years now (and in the neigbhorhood for more than 14) and have been intentionally car-free most of our years here.
- Close-in SE Sellwood neighborhood (SE 15th Ave.) — great neighborhood for summer!
- Less than a mile from the river; walking distance to several wonderful parks (Sellwood Park, Westmoreland Park, Johnson Creek Park) and the Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge, bike paths, restaurants, grocery stores, Oaks Park amusement park (Oaks Park may not be open this summer due to CoViD-19 considerations), boat dock, golf, downtown, library, and more!
- Wonderful neighborhood for young families or folks wanting a home base to use to get to know Portland.
- Large L-shaped lot, partly fenced. The property is fully fenced on three sides and part of the 4th side. Most of the 4th side does not have a fence and is open to the street – see photo.
- House would be rented furnished, and rent would include all utilities.
- Renters could play with our four beautiful cats [they’re super-easy: short-hair, quiet, very child-friendly outdoor cats (just fill their food bowls once a day!) — or we could have a friend help with them].
Two story, four bedroom house. Comfortably sleeps 7, but can easily sleep 9 or 10 (with some sleeping on sofas!) Each room has one large window with a full comfy bay window seat in the Music room and smaller windows in the bathrooms. The home is NOT wheelchair friendly – as it was built in 1905 – and doorways, corners and uneven floors, do not currently accommodate the use of a wheelchair inside the home.
This is a very funky house – not set up traditionally.
Neighborhood lore has it that when our home was first built in 1905 it was originally constructed as a one-room cabin (an in-law unit to the neighbor’s house) – and subsequently added-on-to. and added-on-to again, over the years. The various downstairs rooms’ floors are at different heights (the music room was the “sunken” living room architectural style popularized on The Dick Van Dyke Show!) and some of the rooms are unusual shapes and sizes!
Instead of a dining room, we have set that room up as a play room. Instead of a living room we have set that room up a music room (we have a piano, an electric organ, a drum set, etc). The house is also in various stages of updating and improvement – however all systems and elements (i.e. electrical systems, appliances, plumbing, roof, etc.) are safe and functional.**
Safety details:
- Smoke Detectors: Newer (all installed in past 12 months) working First Alert smoke / carbon monoxide detectors in each bedroom (including some installed in June 2020). Aflink: https://amzn.to/2UhyctO
- Newer Windows: Double-hung newer (Lead-free / installed in 2007) vinyl windows have the option be opened from the top-down to prevent potential falls by young children. These windows also have a lifetime warranty against breakage – including if a kid throws a baseball directly at them! The windows also have two separate mechanisms to lock from the inside.
- Upgraded Electrical: Recently updated outlets throughout house (most outlets updated in June of 2020.)
- Lead Concerns: Lead hazard remediation done throughout the home in 2007 (before we moved in) and c. 2010 (through the federally funded City of Portland Lead Hazard Reduction Grant Program.) Any specific concerns in this area will be reviewed with potential tenant before agreeing to rent the home. I consider this home to be Lead-safe, but not Lead-free.
- Water Filtration: Under-sink water filtration for drinking and cooking water in kitchen. Triple-filter including Lead, Chloramine and General Carbon filter. The most recent water test for our kitchen sink’s filtered water (from June of 2019) came in at “Less than 1 ppb” – which is the lowest available Lead-in-water test result for most testing methodologies.
- No Flouride!: Note: city water in Portland is NOT fluoridated. (Yay!)
- The home is not baby-safe: While we welcome tenants with children of all ages (we raised our children here), I want to acknowledge that the home (as appointed and furnished) is not baby safe. There are stairs without baby gates and no baby-safety accommodations in the kitchen (or other cabinets or closets in the home.) The play room has toys that are appropriate for older children and may present choking hazards or other concerns for younger children. [Our children are 24, 17, 15 and 11 years old.]
Other Considerations:
- Pet Free / Scent Free Home: Sorry we aren’t able to accommodate your pets at this time. Our house is a pet-free / scent-free house (on the inside) because of my husband’s allergies. Our cats are outside “mousers” – because, in a very populated city you need help keeping mice away! We ask that any potential tenant agree to keep the home scent free (including use of scent-free cleaning products – which we will provide – and limited use of any scented personal care products when possible.)
- Smoke Free Home: We are not able to rent to a smoker (same reasons as above – allergies), although we are “420 friendly” we just ask that any 420 activities are done outside. Thanks!
Furnishings & Room Setup
(will update with photos a.s.a.p.)
Downstairs:
- Bunk room bedroom: includes a bunk bed and a loft bed with a total of four twin beds, a desks and a dresser.
- Music room: includes upright piano, a vintage 1970s (?) Hammond electric organ, drum kit and other instruments (& sofa and window seat!)
- Bonus room: including working wood-burning fireplace, shelves full of books.
- Play room: sofa, coffee table, plus shelves full of games and art supplies.
- Kitchen: 5-burner gas stove and eat-in breakfast nook (note: there is no formal “dining room” right now in this house – the room next the kitchen that was designed to be the dining room has been repurposed as the play room.)
- Outdoor dining: Two separate eating areas outdoors too — including one right outside of the kitchen (we eat there almost every day in the Spring and Summer).
- Bathroom: (off of kitchen) with toilet, sink and high capacity washer and dryer.
- Closets: Coat closet and broom closet off of kitchen.
- Kids Nook: Original coat closet by music room has been redone as a lighted, cosy nook for a small child (with a lighted switch, and a lovely custom- built wooden “Torii gate arch” where the door was!)
- Gymnastics or yoga area: Original front entry way is not used to enter house, and has been set up as a child’s gymnastics area — with gymnastic rings securely anchored in the overhead heavy beam and a professional gymnastics mat!
Upstairs
- Master bedroom with new California-King-sized organic Naturepedic bed https://shareasale.com/r.cfm… (aflink!) and direct door to full bathroom. Also in this room: two dressers and night stands.
- Second bedroom with new Queen-sized organic Naturepedic bed, dresser, shelves, armoire, child’s desk (with chair) and armchair.
- Office (aka: third upstairs bedroom) / is set up as a cosy T.V. / Family room home theater with a sectional couch and large-screen T.V. hooked up to an Apple T.V., Internet, Netflix, Amazon, etc. [This is actually my home office, which I like to have upstairs away from the kids!] There is currently no door on this room. This room has direct access to a shared jack-and-jill bathroom with the Master bedroom.
- Full bathroom: (the house has no bathtub, but this upstairs bathroom has a great shower with a built in tile stool – as well as a sink and a newer toilet.) Note: if you are taller than 6 feet, the shower may be a little cramped for you as there is a sloped ceiling.)
- Closets: There are two closets upstairs, each is in a hallway alcove (one outside the bathroom and one at the top of the stairs.) Neither of these closets has a separate door. [This is part of the funkiness of the house!]
Outside
- 8-foot-long wooden picnic table with integrated benches
- Straw bales for sitting (or jumping) on (similar to what is pictured)
- Raised-bed vegetable garden, blackberry & raspberry bushes, and fruiting cherry trees & plum tree!
- 4 gorgeous, sweet, kid-friendly outdoor cats (“Dumbledore”, “Bobbie”, “Baby Striped Cat”, and “Midnight”)
- Round metal patio table with outside metal chairs and rocking bench.
- In-ground dirt and stone fire-pit.
- Wood and Metal play house with doors and windows.
- Partly fenced yard (not fully-fenced)
- On- and off-street parking.
- Corner lot home across from Catholic Church (Saint Agatha’s)
Utilities included:
- Landline phone
- High speed Comcast internet
- NW Natural Gas (stove/oven, heat, and water heater)
- Electric
- Garbage (recycling picked up every week, garbage picked up every other week)
- City water & sewer service
- May be able to include house-cleaning for $100 extra a visit ($25/hour for a 4-hour visit) with advance commitment (once or twice a week). This is with a good friend of ours who we have known for years and trust 110%!
Price:
Price to be determined. Please understand this is a highly desirable neighborhood with next-to-no full homes for rent. As we need to cover our costs if we rent the home for a month or two, it may be much less expensive for you to get an Air-B-n-B rental home in another nearby Portland neighborhood. If you are searching for comps please look for properties specifically in the Sellwood neighborhood of Portland (which is a specific neighborhood on the river in the “Close-In Southeast” part of town.) In a recent search for 3 to 4 bedroom rental homes in Sellwood on Craigslist there were zero homes available. Some “comps” for context,
- A 600 sf, 1-bedroom ADU in Sellwood is renting for $1,795 and that is the only Sellwood property we could find on Craigslist this week.
- We also found a Sellwood studio on AirBNB that normally rents for $2,155 for the month but is “on sale” for $1,401 for the month of August (with all the fees through AirBNB the price for the month is actually $1,887.)
- A 1-bedroom unit in Sellwood is available on AirBNB for a total price of $2,422 including fees.
- A 2-bedroom apartment in Sellwood on AirBNB is available for $2,667 for the month of August including fees.
- A 2-bedroom house can be had for August (on AirBNB) in Sellwood for $3,940 (including fees).
While our home is technically a 4-bedroom house (with three rooms set up as bedrooms) it is by no means a tony ready-to-move-in gorgeous re-done Air-B-n-B…. so we are focused on coming up with a rate that is fair and takes in to account the fact that this our family home (with unique and quirky “amenities” specific to our family!)
**Use of garage and storage shed would not be included in the rental.
**Hot tub is NOT noted as an amenity as our small outside two-person hot tub (on a downstairs deck off of the bonus room (behind the house) is not fully functioning at this time and we are not sure if it will be repaired by August. This is a hot tub our family has used daily for the past 8 years or so, but it recently had a jet break (in June of 2020) and we have not yet had it assessed to see if it can be repaired. It is still functioning with the exception of the broken jet.
Some links may be affiliate links. If you purchase something after clicking on one of my affiliate links I may receive a small percentage of what you spend at no extra cost to you.
Email if interested: TamaraRubin@mac.com
Picture below from February 2020
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