A couple or a small family with some renovation energy would find much to like in the three-bedroom white stucco house at 345 Maple in Elmhurst.
The compact home’s construction seems solid and offers a sensible layout, some big rooms and a charming architectural design. The house also has some craftsman-like touches from an earlier era, including lots of built-in furniture.
It is listed as “older,” meaning it dates back at least 50 years, said Kristie Michel, listing agent for Prudential Prairie Path Realtors, at a recent open house. It is on the market for $239,000; taxes are listed at $3,461 for 1992.
From the outside, a deep triangular gable over the front door and smooth stucco walls give the English-style home a cottage-like appearance.
Inside the door is an entryway with a coat closet on the left and a diamond-paned leaded window over the mail slot on the right. The tile floor needs updating.
Spacious living room
The rest of the first floor is on a slightly higher elevation. Up three steps ahead is the 23-by-19 living room, separated from the entry by the ledge of a built-in bookcase to the right.
Fresh-looking powder-blue paint covers the walls and natural light pours in from a bay window with a western exposure. You would want to replace the worn blue carpeting, or better yet, pull it up and refinish the hardwood floor underneath.
A gas fireplace is dressed up with a white wood mantelpiece. The fireplace has been converted to gas but could be reconverted to burn wood, Michel said.
There is hot water baseboard heating along a couple of the walls, and, curiously, electric outlets have been installed directly above it at approximately six-inch intervals. You may need to plan furniture placement carefully to hide them.
An arched doorway leads from the living room to a formal 14-by-10 dining room. It has a white chair rail, a bay window facing south and a hardwood floor under the carpeting.
A door off the dining room opens to a 20-by-10 bedroom with an unfinished oak floor and another series of electric outlets over the baseboard heating. Across a short hallway from the bedroom is a bathroom done up in gray tile and kelly green floral wallpaper.
At the end of the hallway is a modest 13-by-9 kitchen, with a window and a doorway to a 17-by-12 family room. You could knock down the wall between the two rooms to create a spacious and bright kitchen and breakfast area. As it is, only one cook could work in the kitchen at a time.
Updates for the kitchen
You might also want to install new cabinets and counters in the kitchen, which is cheerful, if dated. It has plenty of yellow cabinets above and below yellow counters, and what appear to be older appliances.
In one wall of the knotty pine family room is a wonder of built-in cabinets and desk space. Behind one set of cabinets are built-in stereo speakers, which are wired into the living room and come with the house.
Windows stretch across two other sides of the room and a door opens to the back yard. A tree grows in the middle of a patio, which has a built-in barbecue grill. Behind it is a two-car detached garage with a separate tool room.
A screened-in porch attached to the back of the garage would make a perfect setting for summer dinners. It looks out on a yard sprinkled with big shade trees, a curved flower border and an arbor in the middle of raised flower beds.
Back inside, steps to the basement are behind a door off the dining room. The basement is unfinished but freshly painted, with plenty of storage space, as well as a workroom and a shower stall. The house is heated by gas and hot water. The hot water heater is not more than three years old, Michel said, but the boiler looks many years older.
From the living room, a staircase leads to the second-floor bedrooms. If you are tall, you might need to stoop on the top landing. Ceilings are higher in the bedrooms on either side of the landing.
The 23-by-21 master bedroom stretches across the back of the house. It was added on to the original home, but doesn’t show the seams of an appendage.
With such large room dimensions, a family could build a wall and make two small bedrooms here.
As it is, the room has an alcove suitable for a vanity and windows with exposures on three sides. The oak floors are in good shape and the room has plenty of storage space in two double-door closets as well as a separate walk-in closet.
At the front of the house is a 23-by-12 bedroom, which has a window seat built into a gable. The room has no closet, only low doors to storage areas under the sloped roof line.
Between the two bedrooms is a tidy bathroom that could use some updating.
The house is located on a shady street full of well-maintained homes only a couple of blocks from a business stretch of York Road and less than a mile from an entrance ramp to the Eisenhower Expressway.
