Buy a Batavia house for just $1 -- land not included

For $1, a handyman's special can be yours.

The City of Batavia is selling a one-story house it owns at 12 S. River St. (Route 25). Of course, the catch is that you have to move it elsewhere.

And you'll have to fix a hole in the floor.

"From the outside, it is not terrible," said Jerry Swanson, the city's community development director, who is taking offers.

The city bought the three-bedroom house, which was last used as Linnea's Hair Salon, for $235,000 in 2008. The owner was looking to get rid of it, and the city owns the lots north and south of it.

City officials are contemplating using the land as part of a project to revitalize the neighborhood just east of the Fox River. "It makes for a much more logical project," Swanson said.

In the meantime, the city is tired of maintaining it, and officials think a lawn would look better there. Although the house is in Batavia's historic district, it is classified as a "noncontributing structure" with little to no historical or cultural value. It has been vacant more than a year.

A Batavia Township property card says it was built in 1870, but Swanson estimates it was built in the 1930s or 1940s, judging by its style and construction.

If the house is not sold, the city will demolish it next spring.

"The city council thought it would be an environmentally responsible thing" to first offer the house for sale, Swanson said, rather than immediately raze it and dump it in a landfill.

Letters of interest are due to Swanson Nov. 1, and should be sent to him at the Batavia Government Center, 100 N. Island Ave. Prospective buyers will then have 60 days to work out the details of moving the building, including getting a new foundation poured and utility lines run to the new site.