Today, I would do any one of those average deals in a heart beat because they would be amazing by todays standards.

Take ownership of your mistake and learn to do the proper due diligence recommended above😊 My heart fills with much gratitude when I read your very detailed and very helpful comment.

You can call the county/city planning and see if a permit was pulled AND was it inspected and signed off as workman-like.If your heart is set on this house it's time to ask for big price reduction or cancel and move on.

Dude if you were born in this country and or have gained legal citizenship, you have every right to put a purchase contract on anything your heart desires and turn around and sell that contract to anyone your heart desires.    

I can't tell you how happy I am that my heart surgeon didn't learn how to do my valve replacement exclusively from the internet. 

We put our heart and soul into the project and it paid off.

After a few weeks the seller had a change of heart and we worked out a compromise.

James Wise, I don't know your heart and it is possible that you had good intentions when you wrote that article but please understand that labeling neighborhoods as undesirable for whatever reason can negatively impact the livelihood and well-being of the people that live there, plus it's illegal.

There's 20 great restaurants and as many great bars (not to mention the Durham Bulls Stadium, DPAC, and American Tobacco Campus, which is expanding) within a 1/2 mile radius from the heart of downtown. 

it is certainly not for the faint of heart.