Sun Valley Property News: June 2014 issue

The Return of the Investment House
by Sheridan Brett

It is every child’s fantasy at one point or another to live in a treehouse. In adulthood, we abandon the aspiration as quixotic, settling for the garden-variety house, anchored into the ground, reassuring our maturation into society. This newly completed investment home in Lane Ranch, the first to grace our valley since 2007, and ready to be shown to prospective buyers, slaps our jaded adult faces saying, “Your childhood dream is all grown up”. 

This structure is not clinging to a tree, as the one we imagined in our youth, but communicates with nature via a reverse floor plan aimed at gifting its inhabitants a sense of oneness with the beautiful landscape that surrounds this prestigious neighborhood. Instead of hiding beneath trees, the house lifts you to their level, giving you the same floating quality you remember from climbing to your fist canopy. The great room’s open floor plan and floor-to-ceiling windows seamlessly connect to the 280-degree wrap-around deck, providing a natural flow for indoor-outdoor living. This investment home not only forces a nostalgic smile with its suspended quality that revives our childlike sense of wonder, but also represents a return of faith to the housing market, pleasing our adult responsibilities. 

We sat down for the inside view of this arboreal oasis with the team: Architect Steve cook, Builder Rod Watson (owner of RA Watson Construction), Bob Kesting of REMAX River Run Realty, and Interior Designer Barbara Paige of Irvine, CA (via email) to journey into the project from its conception and design to its connotations for the Valley’s real estate market. 

Inside The Project

An investment house, by definition, refers to a structure built in anticipation of finding a buyer. The owner makes the investment by creating the house, and then seeks to sell it. This can be a dating task, as the needs of house hunters are particular, with an immeasurable range of tastes and intentions. How do you construct something for a fictional customer? How do you navigate building something bold and beautiful, and simultaneously be appealing on a mass level? For the buyers of this particular lot, the answer was simple: assemble an amazing team and have faith in their abilities and vision. 

When architect Steve Cook first sat down with the client, he wasn’t sure if he had heard correctly. Complete design freedom is a rarity in the field, and you never know how far it really goes. “Had I just heard ‘go for it’? Steve recalls. “Freedom of design can be a lot like letting a big dog off-leash… and the backyard isn’t fenced. However, it is also the highest expression of trust and respect extended to any design team. If allowed to be fully explored, everyone involved in a creative endeavor will reap the rewards that process has to offer.” In this case, the client laid the groundwork for a successful project with the gift of liberty.

The result is a space that the crew can be proud of. Rod Watson says of its completion, “When we first started this project, I could envision how wonderful the finished product could be, and it went beyond my expectations. I can imagine a family living in this incredible space, with its marriage of practical livability and the entertaining mecca that is the great room.” Barbara Paige selected a palette of colors and materials that translated to the transparent style from Steve’s vision of the exterior through to the interior, successfully pulling everything together. The result is a unique and customized environment, whose objective was perfectly realized by Rod. The house’s manufacture is truly a collaborative and artistic creation from breaking ground to its last interior detail. If a team is as great as the sum of its parts, you can count this structure as Herculean invention meets Tarzan: strong and fit for a god, yet also suited for a tree-dweller. 

“The ability to realize full creative freedom allowed us to stray from blending in as the proverbial ‘house next door.’ Instead, we were able to reach out and embrace the tremendous views of the surrounding rock cliffs, pond, and Baldy, conversing with nature as playmate and neighbor.” — Steve Cook, Architect

And what does an effort like this mean for our real estate market, where the building of an investment property hasn’t occurred in almost seven years? This signals a return of belief, and the return of the willingness to take a calculated risk. “With measured growth of over seven percent in the lat year,” says realtor Bob Kesting, “residents and second home owners recognize the opportunity for appreciation in their real estate investments. Our economy has recouped to allow for new development, which is seen through the recent rise in vacant lot purchases, demonstrating a stimulus for the entire local economy in the future.” For homeowners, treehouse lovers, and visitors, the return of the investment house is a barometer of better times.