An Alley Runs Through It: How a Lakewood Couple Haggled With the City and Won

When Kyle and Amanda Kraft purchased 6706 Southridge Drive in 2015, they thought it would be their forever home. Plans changed and they’re moving to another part of Texas now, but with help from their Realtor, they’re leaving the property a lot better than they found it. 

Their story starts with an unsightly abandoned alley next to their property in North Ridge Estates.

Realtor Patience Arthur, who lives in Lakewood near the Southridge home, represented the Krafts when they first bought the home and again earlier this month when they sold it. But the Clay Stapp + Co Realtor did more than a buyer’s or seller’s agent normally would.

She helped the Krafts take matters into their own hands to ensure their beloved home could sit on a contiguous sprawling lot, and a City-owned alley wouldn’t prevent them or future owners from adding on. 

“We were on a mission and we weren’t going to take no for an answer,” Kyle Kraft told CandysDirt.com.

Alley Oops

When the Krafts purchased the three-bedroom, three-bathroom home on Southridge Drive, the 0.87-acre property consisted of three adjacent lots — two interior lots along McCommas Branch Creek and one facing Southridge Drive where the home sits. 

How the property became that way is buried in old newspaper archives. After much research, the Krafts discovered parts of this Northridge Estates neighborhood were once the bygone Bob-O-Links Golf Course. That’s why the streets are a little off: Alexander Drive merges into Southridge Drive, and then bends into Hillbrook Street. The plat map doesn’t look cut and dry.

“The lots were separated by an old Dallas alleyway, which greatly limited their plans for improvements to the existing home structure and use of the backyard,” Arthur said. 

Kyle Kraft told CandysDirt.com that they didn’t know at the time that “it was a requirement that you could only build on a lot that had street access.”

“That was news to us,” he said.

Expand Out or Up

The home was built in 1950 and is described in the listing as “beautiful, spacious, well-designed, and updated … with multiple options to expand out or up.”

But, Arthur explained, that wasn’t the case until the Krafts got involved.

“It’s a great lot,” Arthur told CandysDirt.com. “[The Krafts] wanted a lot; they wanted land. So many people these days are building side to side, front to back. They wanted the open space.” 

So while the home was under contract in 2015, the Krafts began the process of petitioning the City to legally abandon the alley, which was no longer in use and completely overgrown in most areas, Arthur explained. 

“[The alley] was an invisible evil, but an evil, nonetheless.”

“You couldn’t even see the alley,” Arthur said. “If you looked out in the backyard it was nothing but a big grassy backyard. Because the City of Dallas still owned it, they were precluded from building anything over it — expanding, pools, guest houses, whatever.

“My clients didn’t end up building over the alley but they did end up building a swimming pool and a pool house,” she said. “They did end up benefiting from going through the process because it increased the resale value to have one contiguous lot.” 

Hurdles With the City and Homeowners

But achieving that contiguous lot wasn’t easy. The Realtor got on the phone with city engineers asking what the process was and if it was do-able. She was told that all affected property owners would have to agree for the alley to be abandoned in order for the city to legally do so. Neighbors on all sides would have to agree.

“There were some setbacks along the way, some elderly homeowners who were disinterested in the undertaking, at least one home in probate at the time, plus lots of hurdles in dealing with the City, but fast forward a couple of years, and the goal was achieved,” Arthur said. 

Each homeowner along the abandoned part of the alley was granted the option to purchase their respective part of the alley. Some homeowners backed up to the alley and others’ properties were separated by it.

No one else wanted to buy in, so once making their neighbors aware of what they were doing, the Krafts proceeded with the purchase of the alley and it was replatted into one contiguous lot. 

“There’s a lot of history in that particular area of Lakewood that ties in, along with the knocking on doors we did in attempts to get the property owners on board,” Arthur said. “My clients also did a tremendous amount of research, including studying the original city plans and roadways, and having a solid understanding of how it evolved and what probably went wrong along the way.”

What’s Next

The Krafts are off to another forever home, but the new owners, who purchased 6706 Stoneridge Drive on Feb. 4 for about $2 million now own the lot, the house, and the alley — thanks to the Krafts. 

“Lakewood is really unique, quirky, with the creek,” Kyle Kraft said. “This used to be part of the Bob-O-Links Golf Course, so we don’t have city drainage. The pond is next to us and the creek is there … it all flows to White Rock Lake. You want to have access and flow.

“For instance, if we had built over [the alley], how would we have gotten a mower over to that side of the property? How would water then flow? You have to think about those things before you put up concrete and structures,” Kraft said.

A lot of care went into their decisions to buy the alley and also where they made improvements, Kraft explained. We can only hope the new owners recognize the love that the Krafts have for 6706 Southridge Drive.