‘Paying Top Dollar’ For A ‘Glorified Apartment’
The Star Tribune reports on the problems with condos. “As the pace of condo, loft and townhouse construction continues unabated, some buyers are discovering myriad problems with their ‘carefree’ homes.”
“Eager for a carefree lifestyle, Sandy Obermiller proudly moved into her new condominium in St. Louis Park in 2002. She had purchased it a year earlier, before the development was even a hole in the ground, and was promised a luxury condominium for her $250,000 investment.”
“What she got was a condo where she can hear neighbors talking, phones ringing next door and other people’s washing machines draining. The windows and basement leak. The deck floor is failing. The building looks unfinished. ‘I want what I originally bought into,’ said Obermiller. ‘I feel taken.’”
“Obermiller, along with other buyers at Fern Hill Place condominiums, sued the building’s developer, architect, builder and subcontractors. Last month they settled for $1.85 million.”
“Buyers paying a premium for lofts, condos and townhouses expect high-quality construction and quiet. But often what they get behind the gleaming surfaces and lofty ceilings is an ordinary apartment in which owners can hear the clack-clack of high heels overhead and smell cigarette smoke from five floors below and moldy odors emanating from electrical outlets.”
“The building code for condos and lofts is a low standard that doesn’t always translate into high-quality construction. Nor does it ensure that all units in a building will meet even minimal standards.”
“‘For all practical purposes, actually for all purposes, apartments and condos are constructed the same way,’ said Mike Godfrey, with the Minnesota Codes and Standards Division. ‘The only difference is one you own and the other one you rent.’”
“And price doesn’t ensure better air sealing. Dave Bohac said that a two-year-old luxury condo building was one of the leakier ones in the study. The details of air sealing and indoor air quality aren’t on developers’ radar, said Marilou Cheple, a former builder and home inspector who teaches at the University of Minnesota. ‘Nobody makes them do it, so my goodness, why would they?’ she said.”"The result is that some buyers are paying top dollar for what amounts to an apartment with cosmetic enhancements. And unlike renters, they can’t just pick up and move without risking a financial hit. Some at Fern Hill Place tried, but ended up selling for less than they paid, said Andrew Marshall, the lawyer representing the owners.”
“It becomes a big-stakes game: ‘At one arbitration, there were 35 lawyers sitting in the room,’ said Steven Orfield, a Minneapolis acoustics consultant and expert witness in several multimillion-dollar lawsuits.”
Thanks to the reader who sent in this link.
If the condos had gone up in value knowone would be complaining.
This is just a nice little preview of the markets flip side.
Hey I just wanted to have fun with the loan guys. Here is the link
http://www.loanagentslive.com . Below is the chat I had with him. Too funny.
mike:
I hear we are in a bubble. should I refi?
Welcome mike! Your request has been directed to the Florida Loan Officer department. Please wait for our operator to answer your call.
Call accepted by operator Bob. Currently in room: Bob, mike.
Bob:
Hi, This is Bob from Global Home Loans. How are you?
mike:
ok
mike:
hi Bob
Bob:
How can I help you.
mike:
I have a house in Wesley Chapel. I have been thinking about refi but so many people are selling
Bob:
Yes,
Bob:
What would you like to try to accomplish by refinancing?
mike:
I have one of those Option Arm
mike:
I want to get into a fix rate but I don’t know if I can
Bob:
Yes, you can get into a fixed rate. But you need to look at your current mortgage. Being an ARM. It probably doesn’t have a pre-pay. But if it does you should read and see what kind of pre-pay it has and what the penalty is for getting out. Refinancing it.
Bob:
Do you know the terms as far as the rate ceiling. In other words how high the rate can go?
Bob:
Hello
mike:
I got the loan last year. I borrowed 260,000 and I thought my house is worth 325,000
mike:
but now i see people listing for about 300,00 around my neighborhood
Bob:
For the same type of home? The same style, SF and condition?
mike:
yeah similiar to mine
mike:
I haven’t gone in to look yet but I am freaking out
Bob:
Boy, I can imagine how frustrating that must have been for you.
mike:
I was told by my realtor that this place is growing so I bought last year
mike:
now I am regreting it
Bob:
You shouldn’t worry. Lets look at a couple of things. First what was the appraised value last year? Was it 325k? Have you done any improvements since you purchased it? Housing values generally incerase. So the value has probably stayed the same or possibly increased. But it sounds like it probably stayed the same. Especially since you only purchased it a year ago.
mike:
No I haven’t really done anything yet. I bought it for 325k but now people are selling for less than I bought. I borrowed money from my parents to buy this place…
Bob:
You will usually find places that sell for more or less then yours. But the market has a whole hasn’t crashed. As real estate is typically the largest and best investment that anyone can make. It was nice of your parents to help you purchase the property.
Bob:
Houses can sell for less. Especially if the house needs alot of work or updates. Also if it was a foreclosure it would sell for less as well. Realtos generally know the market very well. So if they informed you that you invested in a property where it is growing. Then it is generally safe to assume that your value would increase not decrease.
Bob:
Where do you see the prices falling. Are you looking at a realtor listing on-line. In the papers?
mike:
I went to realtor.com to see how the market is
mike:
and saw all those listings for 300k
mike:
i feel so screwed
In Irvine we have “Watermarke” some new condos. One of our friends bought one - noisy, could hear the neighbors above/below, etc. These are the ones I called once and the 2 bedroom they are asking about $750K!!
I would actually prefer condo living over a single family home, but you cannot get away from the noise. One smart builder will eventually find a way to keep things quiet and he/she will rack in the dough even in the housing downturn.
It isn’t terribly difficult to make a building soundproof. Lot of different ways to accomplish this, even on a rehab. It is generally a matter of the builder not being too concerned if the owners hear each other.
Yes, instead of find a way to keep things quiet, I should have said will build to keep things quiet. Maybe some of the very high end new buildings actually do this, I just don’t know.
It costs money to actually do this, however, but it isn’t rocket science:
Basically, it comes down to floors that are well built and don’t flex (and therefore creak) and insulation in the interior walls and ceilings to keep the noise out.
Make sure that the pipes are embedded in insulation too, to prevent the gurgling noises from carrying.
The most common complaint I hear is about high heels / hard-sole shoes / pets’ claws on a hard surface above. That could have been cured, mostly, by requiring a layer of sound-absorbing material under any tile. Without that covenant/condo doc requirement, people can glue the tiles to the concrete slab and they will do so, potentially dooming the unit below to noise harrassment ad infinitum. If a condo has concrete interior walls between units, sound intrusion should be minimal if you have neighbors who are close to civil.
Should have noted that “concussive” noise (the high heels upstairs) carries much farther and louder than other types. That is why trapped miners and submariners “tap” to reach their rescuers.
exactly. when i was in an apt. the thumping of slamming drawers, etc. was way worse than talking.
You can read part 2 of this series on condos at
http://www.startribune.com/389/story/447907.html
Luxury condos are neither.
‘At one arbitration, there were 35 lawyers sitting in the room,’
You would think that they would get together and try and get a group rate with one lawyer. Next they will be bidding up lawyer rates!
coincidence….
Big & bad news coming this week, save your fannies…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/19/AR2006051901789.html
Does anyone know when the report will be issued? Tommorow morning of afternoon?
*or
morning
thanks!
More on Las Vegas condos.
‘Las Vegas’ big plans for high-end condos seem to be unraveling. CNBC’s Jane Wells reports.’
““The demand is very high. In fact right now you have about 10,000 units that are being constructed. And 90 percent of those are sold out already. So I don’t think there is a shortage of demand. I think what there is, is a shortage of labor, and the problem goes back to increased building costs,” says Chris Sullivan of Sullivan Realty.”
this dude and the “dirt mound as Roman obelisk” guy are participants in the same work-release program.
bacon,
So many of the folks like Mr. Sullivan obviously think the rest of us are complete idiots. Uh, dude. If the DEMAND were there, the LABOR would be there. Yeah uh huh, and everything else would fall into place too. Even though I live in Portland, OR Vegas has always been my target market. I can continue to rent well below what a mort. payment would buy and winter in Vegas along w/ the tax adv. Vegas crashing is really important to me.
Yeah, the ‘construction cost’ argument is getting old. Didn’t this guy hear that the public builders are laying off supers and labor? And if costs are too high for million dollar condos, what can they build that will raise more cash?
Ben,
Well, “construction costs” were high in 2005 too, were they not? That didn’t seem to bother anyone. What’s changed since then Mr. Sullivan? Oh, uh interest rates have……. Oh you know what? Just forget it! These guys don’t get it b/c they don’t WANT to get it. The people that bought in 2004 and 2005 were fools (b/c we ALL are you know) so he just need to find more fools! Well Mr. Sullivan, were just fresh out of greater fools.
90% sold out? how many to flippers?
‘At one arbitration, there were 35 lawyers sitting in the room,’
Darn, and me with only 13 bullets. Remember, aim for the wallet, even if you were good enough to hit the heart it wouldn’t make any difference.
Robert Cote, you are awesome!!! your sense of humor is crisp and cold, the way it ought to be.
Yes, crisp and cold (and biting)….like an overhopped IPA.
Well Said Cote!
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m getting thirsty.
It’s possible to overhop an IPA? Darn, now I have to go to Trader Joe’s and perform my own independent analysis, a very extensive analysis. Thanks for the kind words even if it is almost to easy.
Remember that for lawyers, you need silver bullets. Especially during a full moon.
Darn, and me with only 13 bullets.
Gotta remember to keep those two extra clips handy.
““‘For all practical purposes, actually for all purposes, apartments and condos are constructed the same way,’ said Mike Godfrey, with the Minnesota Codes and Standards Division. ‘The only difference is one you own and the other one you rent.’”
Another reason to rent in the bubble markets while prices continue to decline.
David
http://bubblemeter.blogspot.com
As some one who has done new kitchens and Bathrooms in Condos that were converted from Apartments I can attest to the poor quality of construction and corner cutting. I’ve had the drywall off on three places and was horrified to see that they had used extra spacing between the studs to save on lumber and the 2×4’s were undersized also. No insulation used in most cases explaining the sound transmission problems noted in the article. Drywall joints that would crack due to poor framing along with doors going out of plumb leaving nice air gaps. There is no excuse for this kind of crap when you are charging people $800K but they try and get away with it anyway.
I knew it. The bubble bursting is going to be the full employment act for alwyers. Every realtor and mortgage broker is going to be going to law school.
simmssays…
http://www.americaninventorspot.com
Augh!!! Say it ain’t so…!
That would be like godzilla being bitten by the radioactive spider!!!
My Bro-In-Law is a lawyer. He is salivating over the bubble burst.
He is in construction defects.
Well, as a practicing attorney, at least I know the competition won’t arrive until at least 2013, since you have to have a bachelor’s degree before they’ll let you into law school–even the crappy ones they have around here. And then, they have to pass the bar exam, which I’m gonna hazard to guess is a little more challenging for these folks then the real estate exam…
Come on Tampaesq - ease up on the University of Florida - Go Gators
I wasn’t talking about UF–I concur that it is a very good law school. But I don’t know where all the graduates go…
Well,
I am a recognized expert on the bar exam, having watched the movie ” My Cousing Vinnie” too many times. It did seem pretty hard.
Perhaps not all is lost…
Bear in mind the barrier to entry for law in most states is approximately 1000% higher than that for realtor’s.
I feel for this gal, really I do. What a great gig for a realtor though. Sit behind an oak desk with a high back leather chair and take money from people that are foaming at the mouth to give it to you! After my wife and I sold our home back the end of 2003, there was NOTHING for rent in our area. We took what we could find and it was awful. Now we rent one of those luxury, high end condos and my wife wanted to make an offer on it. This is small town Oregon so I called the owner, met and made our offer. Since the market was roaring in spring of “05″ he declined and we didn’t realize at the time what a FAVOR he had done us. Since then several problems have surfaced and just by living here we’ve realized that the traffic pattern SUCKS! You can be having a great day, until you get in your car. Besides I think we would feel like we were making mortgage payments on an apartment. A really nice apartment. Nothing more.
I rent a room from a guy here in San Diego who recently paid $500k for this 850sq ft 2/2 condo we live in. I’m not kidding, I can hear the upstairs neighbors when they go pee. And the entire time I sit there thinking to myself, “WHO would pay half a million dollars to listen to their neighbors piss?” Not me! I’ll stick with renting my room for $600/mo thank you very much! Insanity, I tell you.
And I looked it up on the MLS–this same condo sold for $118k in 1998. How these recent home buyers sleep at night is beyond me.
Jeff,
It’s kind of like this: In an avg. 8 hour nights sleep,
Bought in the 90’s? Sleeping like baby.
Bought in 2005? Crying self to sleep like a baby.
The only thing we hear is when our neighbor slams their front door. Annoying? Yes. Annoying enough to actually say something about it? No, not yet. We were friends with the first couple below us and we were downstairs visiting I KNOW you could hear our daughter’s footsteps LOUD and CLEAR! Great……..
I lived in an apt building that went condo….I could not believe people were willing to purchase those things for any price. The construction was awful…we had so many problems, but luckily we were renters so they were not our problems.
The plumming was so poor, that anytime someone above us would abuse their disposal, our apt would flood. This would happen about once a week. The maintanence workers (who we became very friendly with very quickly) said this was a community-wide problem, due to poor plumming design.
Where do I sign up?
I’ve never understood the appeal of buying a condo. I already rent an apartment… why would I want to buy it?
Apartments are about low-cost housing and flexibility (financial and geographical). Buying a condo/apartment sounds lose-lose to me.
novarenter,
I agree! The whole freaking purpose of having a “multiple dwelling” was so that the damn thing would be CHEAPER! Older Americans under the old tax code could utilize their “one time exemption” downsize and pay the place off cash money with out any capital gains, have a little money left over and only have to worry about paying modest H.O.A’s! NOW? Condo’s have become as much (and in some cases more expensive than homes) and have ridiculous H.O.A fees. So that would make it lose, lose, lose?
Condo: They serve as the stepping stone in front of the SFH.
I have been advised to buy a condo to “get in” the market. I refuse to be the stepping stone for somebody elses SFH.
No hard feeling condo owners, Good deal for 200K, but when asked to pay $575K to a “pride of ownership” condo owner in So. Cal….that is what come to my mind.
“Good deal for 200K…” Maybe on the west coast, but in my area $200K for a “glorified apartment” is absolute robbery. The condos around here sold for $80s, $90s in the late 1990s. Now they want $200K? Yeah right.
Another big problem with condos is the way communal areas get quickly trashed when they go even slightly downhill. SFH neighborhoods can certainly become trashier, if distressed owners start renting them out to anyone with a pulse, but at least no yard work and trash pileup is confined to that house, which you can sort of ignore. When a few of the condo owners start renting to drunken college students or ignore poor credit histories/background checks, these places can plummet quick, and it is much harder to ignore. Nothing against college students by the way, but let’s just say a 19 year old guy who sees a city full of vacant rentals is going to probably care a little less about the place than the family of four who owns. Wait until these renters decide to invite 20 of their friends over to use the pool, and someone decides to puke into it and several people use your stairwell as a urinal later in the evening. Yes, you have an HOA, how much they are going to do about this is an open question. How about the dudes above you manage to bust a hole in your ceiling by letting a keg sit in a tub with a leak in it for a whole weekend, leaking water into the ceiling, and eventually the keg pokes through (true story). Well, you can certainly send a bill to the owner of the condo, who is now broke as a joke or he wouldn’t be renting to these people anyway, and good luck getting it from them. What you thought was going to be a luxury environment can change real quickly, much faster than a SFH neighborhood could-at least much more in your face.
I rent a condo in SD. Been here for a while now. In the time I’ve lived here, I’ve seen:
1. A period where some neighbors decided to start leaving soiled underwear all over the common grounds (stairs, in trees, in the parking lot)
2. Neighbors’ cats that decided to piss on every door in the area and even take a crap on my doormat.
3. A fire in one of the garages that destroyed the garage door and the paint up the side of the building. It sat for 2-3 months before they even started fixing it. Took 6 months before it was finally cleaned up and no longer an eyesore in the middle of the complex.
Can’t wait for housing prices to drop so my wife and I can get out of here. Only reason we stay is it is super-cheap because rent hasn’t gone up in like 5 years. Might end up renting one of these McMansions for cheap, though, for a few years.
i can help you with your little cat problem. you’re on your own with the rest of the stuff
‘At one arbitration, there were 35 lawyers sitting in the room,’
You would think that they would get together and try and get a group rate with one lawyer. Next they will be bidding up lawyer rates!
Clarification from an ex construction defect adjuster.
The homeowners (HOA) file a lawsuit (complaint) against the developer. The developer files cross-complaints against every sub contractor who was involved in the construction of the units. (roofers, framers, sheet metal, HVAC, graders, etc, etc.)
Each of the subs files cross-complaints against each and every sub contractor……..well you get the picture.
And the main developer doesn’t actually exist anymore. Rather than being “Lennar corporation”, our apartment complex being condo converted is “Lennar/Emerald Marina Cove LLC”, a partnership between Lennar and Emerald, but as a separate corporate shell.
good luck getting money from Lennar and Emerald when you find out what crappy construction they actually use in these 20 year old apartments, as “Lennar/Emerald Marina Bay LLC” will have issued all its profit as dividend (or laundered as paying off inflated rate loans from Lennar and Emerald) before going bankrupt.
People have been buying condos for decades and only now they start to realize that all they’re buying is an apartment with new amenities (maybe)? I’ve never much seen the sense of it myself. I suppose if you plan to stay in one place for a while and have reasonable financing, you get some cost stability relative to renting over the long term. But otherwise it’s the same as renting except there’s no landlord to complain to.
Townhouses are mentioned briefly in the article. How does everyone feel about those? Stick with an “End Unit”?
I have a townhouse and I am happy with it. I bought something like March of 2000, and have refi-ed to 5-3/8-fixed, so I am sleeping well these days.
Some people like end units. Personally I don’t care that much, but I will say that the utility bills for heating and AC are lower in middle units.
I would never buy a condo though. Had one of those some years ago, and it was a huge mistake. Glad to be rid of the thing, but at least I didn’t have to bring cash to the settlement table when I sold it.
I have rented townhouse apts for the last 8 years, and it is the only way to minimize neighbor ‘interaction’, so to speak. The style has suited me well, and I’ve not had any great problem heating or cooling the places (and I’m in Ohio). No one above or below, and I can get an attached garage for car or storage. There are local condos like this, but more common in my area is the attached ranch-on-a-slab, which are flooding the market right now, and not selling very well. A stupid design, Imho.
Should have said, “having an end unit is the only way etc etc….”. D’oh.
“I rent a room from a guy here in San Diego who recently paid $500k for this 850sq ft 2/2 condo we live in. I’m not kidding, I can hear the upstairs neighbors when they go pee. And the entire time I sit there thinking to myself, “WHO would pay half a million dollars to listen to their neighbors piss?” Not me! I’ll stick with renting my room for $600/mo thank you very much! Insanity, I tell you.”
Years ago I was renting an apartment in Santa Monica. One morning I opened the medicine cabinet and noticed a small hole in the back of it. I put my eye up to it, and I got a closeup of a guy in the adjoining apartment brushing his teeth. Apartments. ugh.
3 story townhouses with direct entry garage are certainly a notch up. i had one for a few years and loved it. i was researching soundproofing panels in the event that i ever got rowdy neighbors, but never ended up needed them.
we had silverfish. they lived inside the walls and so we could never really kill them all.
once in my stacked santa monica apt my downstairs neighbor got a real bad german cockroach problem. they were soon in every unit in the bldg. i sear, i’d rather fight a pitbull with my bare hands than have those little demons crawling through my cupboards and couches
i did rent control in west hollywood…as soon as i saw the roaches - I left. even at $525/mo for 800 sq ft near Spago….
sheople are stupid
To be fair there are some good condos out there that are built to higher standards than most apartments. Notably with concrete or other materials between the walls to deaden sound, keep out smells etc.
Still, that’s just some of them. And even those are atrocious deals in this market.
I was looking at a townhouse-style condo development in 2002. The first two floors were the 2br unit + garages, and the top two floors were the 3br unit. These were brand new, and their literature showed thick sound-proofing mats between the floors. Throw in the concrete fires walls, and I bet that baby was pretty soundproof.
Nonetheless, it made me nervous that the master bedroom in the 2br unit was above the other units garage (think electric garage door opener) and directly below the 3br’s kitchen (think disposal and dishwasher). Who knows, all of the sound proofind might have worked.
In the end, I thought it was damned silly to pay $200 in condo fees when I could buy a townhouse (not a condo) for the same price, $60 HOA dues, and no one living below or above me.
Every day, I pass a 1940s-era 6-unit apartment building that was converted to condos about a year ago. Judging by the sales flyers in the little box outside, the remodeling was fairly superficial (though granite counter tops were installed, of course) and the floorplans were essentially unchanged. Though the conversion was completed by last fall, none of the units had sold as of April. This wasn’t surprising, as the listed price of 500K was clearly excessive for the property in question. Last week, I noticed that the box of sales flyers had been removed, and a new construction crew is now in the process of completely gutting the ground-floor units, putting in new interior walls and everything. This is presumably intended to make the condos appear more modern, but it seems like throwing good money after bad to me. If they wouldn’t sell for 500K before, I can’t imaging anyone paying proportionally more for them, no matter how much they’ve been upgraded inside.
The apartment complex where I live was rumored to go condo last year. Just a few weeks ago they discovered massive, MASSIVE rot underneath the siding. They took the whole side off the building I live in to replace a ton of wood with CCA lumber. I can’t help but thing they are just sugar coating it, fixing the obvious stuff while leaving the rest lurking under for the future owners. If I owned I would have been assessed a fee for repairs. Never mind that the parking isn’t that great, that my neighbors seem to vary in quality from upscale to white trash, and we have no balconies, only thin windows in a sunroom that let in all kinds of heat in the summer and cold, damp air in the winter.
The other complex down the road that went condo was well known for the bathroom effect - to not be rude, let’s just say it’s easy to hear the neighbor in the bathroom after a night at Taco bell. Can’t imagine living there. And yes, every now and then I hear my neighbor taking a piss but that’s it thank goodness. At least I’m a renter.
Thought you might enjoy this story about my mom. She bought a luxury apartment in Orland Park, IL back in 1996. Lower income folks moved in, people started pulling engines in the parking lot, and the whole complex became a ghetto. She sold in 1999 at a loss. Fast forward to 2005. After yet another divorce, she bought another luxury condo condo in Orland Park. Called me complaining about the downstrairs neighbors going out in the parking lot, sitting on their truck tailgate, getting drunk, and belching real loud all night. Some people just don’t learn.
“After yet another divorce…”
Some people just don’t learn.
_________________
LOL. I know the story was about condos, but couldn’t help but notice that statement. Some people never learn how to pick a mate, either. My MIL and FIL have at least 7 divorces between them (I don’t think he’s quite ‘fessed up to all of them — he’s been out of the picture a lot). Marrying the wrong people for all the wrong reasons. They keep making rather dumb mistakes in other areas of their lives as well. Wonder if there’s a connection…
Reminds me of an open house I perused back in December 2005. It was a condo conversion, and while decked out on the inside - new floors, fixtures, kitchen, and so on - it was, underneath the covers, a 25 year old apartment building. Lipstick on a pig, as they say.
Walking arond one of the apartments… er, I mean condos… on the top floor the floor was creaking with each step. And they were asking prices starting in the low $300Ks for studio apartments. Amazing.
>>Buyers paying a premium for lofts, condos and townhouses expect high-quality construction and quiet. But often what they get behind the gleaming surfaces and lofty ceilings is an ordinary apartment in which owners can hear the clack-clack of high heels overhead and smell cigarette smoke from five floors below and moldy odors emanating from electrical outlets
‘Buyers paying a premium for lofts, condos and townhouses expect high-quality construction and quiet. But often what they get behind the gleaming surfaces and lofty ceilings is an ordinary apartment in which owners can hear the clack-clack of high heels overhead and smell cigarette smoke from five floors below and moldy odors emanating from electrical outlets”
TRUE STORY….my friend bought a condo in SF. cheap 80’s box. when he moved in it reminded me more of a super 8 motel room than an apartment you’d actually want to live in. Next thing you know, there’s all this noise from upstairs. WTF? so he goes up to confront the neighbor…’what’s with all the noise all the time?’ the guy is really apologetic “sorry but i have a wooden leg’ and pulls up his pant leg to prove it!!
now the HOA is saying that they need to replace the roof…$20K per owner….
After reading this thread, I would never even want to consider a condo. Some great stories.
In my area there are these run down, crummy appartments that they couldnt rent for like $1300 a month. Lo and behold a new coat of paint and some molding — viola!!! Apartment conversions from the $200,000 to $300,000!!!!
These are the biggest pieces of turds around. NO siwimming pool, not gated, no garages, no amenities, nada. Not even porches!