Heavenly views -- South Side condo helps woman make glorious return to city

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - March 28, 2009
By Gretchen McKay

Norma Nieto is a classic example of how heartstrings aren't the only things that can pull you home after years of living in another state. Sometimes, your hometown is also where you find the best bargains.

For more than a decade, the Butler native lived and worked in the Washington, D.C., area. But while she loved being in such an exciting city, she also recognized its challenges when it came to buying real estate.

There's plenty of available housing in our nation's capital, says Ms. Nieto, who graduated from Carnegie Mellon University in 1993, but the prices are "ridiculous." So most home buyers either have to squeeze into something that's incredibly tiny or, if they want something with real space, settle for a home in the suburbs -- hardly the best environment for a young, single woman with an active social life.

Luckily, her job as a consultant with IBM Business Consulting Services wasn't tied to an office, so she could pretty much live anywhere. When the time came to buy her first house after years of careful saving, she happily traded an apartment in a Crystal City high-rise for the town she grew up in. As she explains, "I wanted a change, but not a whole new city. Pittsburgh was the best of both worlds."

But where? An urban girl at heart, Ms. Nieto spent several weekends in the fall of 2007 looking at condo developments and conversion projects in Shadyside and Mount Washington. She and Realtor Kris Callen of Prudential Preferred Realty's Butler office, her best friend from high school, also toured several new buildings in the South Side, including the upscale townhome development Riverside Mews, which Ms. Nieto liked enough to put down a deposit. Then in October she stumbled upon Angel's Arms on Pius Street in the South Side Slopes. It was love at first sight.

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