$2.25M Bay Area home is virtual-background worthy. Glass-wall breakfast nook and all
The breakfast nook — surrounded by a curved wall of glass and a copper turret roof — might be the first thing you notice about this luxury Bay Area home on the market for $2.25 million.
Or, perhaps it’s the incredible privacy.
The 3,329-square-foot home, 8445 Wildcat Drive in El Cerrito, California, sits on the edge of Wildcat Canyon Regional Park on a half-acre lot with mature trees and sweeping views of rolling canyon hills. The vista can be taken in from an expansive wrap-around deck outside or through tall interior windows.
“Probably the first thing is the privacy,” said Dave Ayala, a sales manager for a wine and spirits company. “The entire back of the house, past the property line is all park. There’s no way anybody can build behind me, or to the other side of me. Just having that privacy of being out on the deck ...”
The deck overlooks a backyard shaded by oak trees, which grew pretty wild before Ayala moved there. Lovingly shaped by an arborist, the trees are healthier than ever, he said.
Or is the kitchen the most outstanding feature?
“The kitchen is one of the other big focal points of the house, and just being in the kitchen and having that view in the background has always been a lot of fun,” he added.
And that brings us back to the glass-encased breakfast nook with its copper turret roof.
Like many other employees, Ayala’s wife joined the WFH movement during the COVID-19 pandemic and spent most of her work days in the breakfast nook.
“That’s where, most of the days she’ll be working, is in the breakfast nook, because it is so cool. She does a lot of Zoom calls, and she would get questioned if she was in a virtual background or not,” Ayala said with a chuckle. “And she would just pick up her laptop and go ‘No, this is where we live.’”
With three bedrooms and three baths, the residence features dramatic architecture and soaring ceilings. Design details include knotty pine wood floors in a herringbone pattern. The chef’s kitchen comes with a gourmet stove and a huge picture window above the sink that looks onto trellises of mature grapevines.
“This rare estate offers a countryside retreat of peaceful solitude and offers the ability to host sizable gatherings,” according to the official listing.
An architect designed the home, built in 1996, for his wife and himself, Ayala said. Ayala paid $950,000 for the home in 2014. He estimated he’s put $300,000 into upgrading the house. He did a lot of the work himself.
“No, I’m not a builder,” he said. “Growing up, I was taught a lot of things.”
The home has been on the market for over 40 days, but Ayala knows there’s a buyer out there who will be fall in love with the home and believes it’s as cool as he and his wife do.
“It’s one of these homes where you’ve got to like it,” Ayala said. “And my wife said, ‘you know, it’s not for everybody — it’s only for the cool people.’ And that’s exactly what it is. It’s only for the cool people because if you don’t really get it, and you have to have things a certain way, you’re just not going to enjoy it. But you just kind of go with it.”
The small hillside vineyard grows Pinot Noir grapes. The backyard also has Meyer lemon, pomegranate, apricot, cherry and persimmon trees, as well as table grapes.
“Both two- and four-legged loved ones will appreciate the level grassy area,” the listing states.
There are two two-car garages. The home has an inclinator, a track that Ayala calls “the roller coaster,” which can be used to bring groceries (or even elderly people) down from the level garage to the main house instead of using the stairs.
Another feature of the property stands out at certain times of the day, Ayala said.
“The way that we are set on the hillside, as the sun sets, the house will get shadowed,” Ayala said. “And then you’ll see the hills in the background are all still lit up. That is really cool. Especially if, sometimes, you’ll have the fog start to roll in. And then you have the hills all lit up in the background.“
The listing agents for the home are Grace Bishop and Kim Markison of Red Oak Realty.
This story was originally published August 4, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
