A sign of the times: 137 N. Spring Street in Winston-Salem was listed for sale January 21. The price was $499,000. The sellers accepted an offer four days later. The sale then closed in 16 days. The buyers paid $552,500, more than 10 percent above the asking price.
It’s a great house — built in 1906, located in the Holly Avenue Historic District, beautifully designed and impeccably restored. Still, though, that sale went through at nearly the speed of light in terms of home sales, and even just a few years ago that almost ever happened. Now, it does. A $1.6 million mansion in Greensboro’s Irving Park went from listing to closing in 10 days this month, also selling at a premium to the asking price.
The housing market may or may not be going into the same kind of frenzy that occurred last spring, but, among historic homes, at least, things are heating up. A conspicuous number of sellers are accepting offers within a week or so of listing. A lovely but not spectacular 1926 home in Winston-Salem’s Buena Vista sold last week for $305 per square foot. Perhaps a half-dozen historic homes topped $300 per square foot last year in the Piedmont Triad region; there have been two already this year.
If you’re looking to buy a house right now, be advised. Be ready to compete. And be ready to move fast, or you may not be moving at all.
137 N. Spring Street, Winston-Salem
The Walter and Ethel Conrad House
- Sold for $552,500 on February 10, 2022 (listed at $499,000)
- 3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, 2,807 square feet, 0.24 acre
- Price/square foot: $197
- Built in 1906
- Listed January 21, 2022
- Last sale: $380,000, April 2017
- Neighborhood: Holly Avenue Historic District
- District NRHP nomination: “The Conrad House was listed as under construction in the 1906 city directory. The house is a side-gable, two-story, frame, Colonial Revival with an attached, one-story porch. The porch has clustered Tuscan columns on paneled, wooden piers. There is a central pediment in the porch roof.
- “The house has three pedimented dormers, the middle of which has a Palladian window. Windows are one-over-one.
- “The house has German siding, with vinyl siding on the soffits and frieze. The front door is original and has a large oval light.
- “The roof is pressed metal shingles with curved finials on the gable ends.
- “Conrad was the secretary and treasurer of Vaughan Company.”
- Vaughan & Company was a wholesale grocer.
- William Walter Conrad (1878-1973) was the grandson of Carlos William Transou (1833-1863) and Amanda Louise Ketner Transou (1934-1931). Carlos was a Confederate solider killed during the war. Amanda, widowed for 68 years, never remarried.
- By the time Carlos was killed at age 30, he and Amanda had six children. Middle daughter Laura Rebecca (1857-1939) married Edwin Alexander Conrad in 1877. William Walter was the first of their nine children.
Piedmont Historic Homes 