CLEARVIEW — Steve Gustafson took a leap of faith when he built a mountainous three-story house he hoped to sell as a family investment.
At least, that was the original idea.
It would change the family’s future in ways they didn’t expect.
At more than 7,000 square feet, the house is about three times the size of an average home. To be sure, this was a speculative project aimed at the high, high end of the market. Gustafson wanted the house to put his contracting company on the map and give his family a hard-earned financial cushion.
He found the one-acre parcel online in 2006. At the time, the eastward-facing slope on 172nd St. SE, near Highway 9, had a mobile home and a run-down garage. He saw a ladder nearby and scrambled onto the garage roof. The sight of the Cascade peaks to the east was all he needed to see.
A nearly two-year building project followed.
Gustafson, 37, and his family did much of the labor, except for specialty jobs such as electricity, wallboard, plumbing and roofing. Others helped, including a friend who framed the house and Gustafson’s right-hand-man from his contracting company, Carpenters Sons LLC.
“When we poured the foundation, I remembered jumping around … saying we’re really doing it,” Gustafson said.
Wood for most of the exposed beams and decorative trusses in the home was cut from fir trees taken from the property or were salvaged from Canyon Park Junior High School.
“My parents have bent over backwards for us, both financially and physically,” Gustafson said.
His father, Cliff Gustafson, a retired contractor from Montana, did much of the millwork. Mother Annette did spackling and painting inside.
The finished product could have graced Martha Stewart Living magazine: Maple floors, 26-foot-high living room ceilings and a kitchen brimming with stainless-steel appliances.
They put it on the market in August 2008. The asking price was $1.9 million.
“We thought our ship had finally come in,” Gustafson said, laughing.
Then, they waited.
And that’s all they would do until October, when they decided to take it off the market after Gustafson’s wife, Polly, had their second daughter.
In January, they relisted the house. Still no response.
“Nobody even came to look,” he said.
High-dollar home sales have been declining in Snohomish County during the past three years. During 2006, when Gustafson started his big project, Northwest Multiple Listing Service recorded 96 closed sales countywide on homes listed at $1 million or more. That rose to 117 in 2007, then plummeted — to 42 last year and 16 this year to date.
The area around Clearview and Snohomish was never a hot spot for pricey homes to begin with. Three homes sold there for $1 million or more in 2006 and four in 2007. There was just one such sale in 2008 — in April — and, as of last week, none since.
Early this year, the Gustafsons gave up on plans to sell their house.
To complicate things, Gustafson’s contracting company, Carpenters Sons, had gone belly up near the end of the project because he didn’t have enough money to pay for the licensing or insurance.
By January, however, the Gustafsons started thinking: Why not turn the palatial residence into a home for the elderly and the disabled?
“This has been something I kind of wanted to do,” he said. “The process just got sped up (by five or 10 years) because of the economy — and it certainly wasn’t the plan for this house.”
With room and board running northwards of $4,000 per month, this adult family home would be another high-end venture.
Inspiration to tackle the new project came from words Jesus Christ spoke to his disciples in the Book of Matthew: “Because you have so little faith. I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
Gustafson’s wife thought the Mustard Seed would make a good name. He agreed.
Thus, the Mustard Seed Luxury Adult Family Home was planted. The family’s faith was starting to move this mountainous house in a new direction.
They started talking to other people who run adult family homes, learning what licensing and training they would need.
Eight months later, the week before last, the home received a state Department of Social and Health Services license. The first tenant, an 84-year-old man, moved in last week.
Eventually, there should be space for six residents.
One of the people hoping to find a home in the Gustafsons’ house is Lara Harding, a 35-year-old with cerebral palsy.
She is attracted to the idea of having a larger room than her current lodgings in Bellevue. “In some ways, this is going to be more convenient,” she said.
The economy has Harding in a bind, too.
She said she has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in database management but can’t find paying work. Instead, she volunteers at two jobs as a social worker. She said part-time work might help her move in.
“When there’s jobs given to people with disabilities, we are the first to be cut,” Harding said.
Gustafson and his family aren’t sure how things will go. They plan to work as staff. He, his wife and their two daughters are living on the top floor. His mother-in-law is living in the basement.
“These economic times, you don’t know what they’re going to throw at you,” he said. “We know we’re going to make it; we just don’t know how we’re going to get there.”
Noah Haglund: 425-339-3465, nhaglund@heraldnet.com.
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