A Shuttered Church in Cully Finally Sells

The corner lot property attracted squatters and even caught fire.

Chasing Ghosts 5106 1.1.25
By Nigel Jaquiss
  • ADDRESS: 5503 NE Prescott St.
  • YEAR BUILT: 1931
  • SQUARE FOOTAGE: 2,106
  • MARKET VALUE: $118,500
  • OWNER: Eugene and Shawn Spencer Trust
  • HOW LONG IT’S BEEN EMPTY: 4 years
  • WHY IT’S EMPTY: Tenants left.

For Lars C. Larsen and his wife, Anne Mueller, the bottom came a couple of months ago, when a squatter lit the abandoned church next to their property in the Cully neighborhood on fire.

The blaze, quickly extinguished, came after more than four years of deterioration at the structure that formerly hosted a storefront church called St. Jude’s.

“The property slowly got worse and worse,” says Larsen (no relation to the similarly named talk radio host).

Larsen and Mueller, who own the house immediately west of the shuttered church, recall that things started to slide about a decade ago when the elderly couple who ran the church, Pastor Robert Andrews and his wife, Janette, returned to Mississippi, leaving behind a rent-to-own contract that would eventually have given them title to the property.

Some family members stayed on, in a small house adjacent to the church, but Larsen says they moved out about five years ago.

In terms of location, the property is attractive, situated next to the campus of Rigler Elementary and its extensive community garden. But Larsen says the legacy of Cully’s annexation into Portland in 1985 left most of the neighborhood zoned residential, even the corner lot where the church stands. Although the property was built as a store originally, its zoning and configuration made financing difficult.

The property went on the market in May at $300,000. After a series of reductions, it eventually sold for $180,000 on Dec. 10, according to the listing agent, Ted Williams of Urbane Realty Group. (The deed with the new owner’s name is not yet a public record.) That’s just $10,000 more than it sold for in 2002. Meanwhile, the median home price in Portland nearly tripled.

Larsen is thrilled he won’t have to deal with squatters anymore.

“We are super relieved,” he says. “The new owners are already starting to clean the property up. That’s awesome.”

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