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A slide show of six luxury suburban homes for sale makes us wonder if Metro Times is:
A.) Taken over by real estate hackers.
B.) Competing with Downtown Birmingham/Bloomfield.
C.) Pandering for Realtor ads.
D.) Over-eager for free content.
Metro Times readers seem an odd target for this Bloomfield Township dream site, which goes for $3,650,000.
We hope it's D, and not just because we appreciate free content as much as the next news publication. (OK, maybe more.)
Our first reaction, actually, was: Who replaced Metro Times with Curbed on performance enhancers?
Here's why we're so verklempt:
- A site we've relied on since 1980 for progressive news and views now touts residences listed for $2.3 million to $6.8 million.
- "6 suburban Detroit homes for sale that make us question why we live in the city," says the headline, embarrassingly.
- 40 glitzy slides show lush lansdscapes, boat docks, grand staircases, infinity pools, Food Network-worthy kitchens and long driveways.
A sheepish tone surfaces at the alt.weekly's Facebook page, which links to the gallery of Reaclomp handout images with this comment: "Hey, we can dream."
To which we ask: Hey, why dream so lavishly in a paper branded as "Detroit's free alternative weekly?" Alternative to what, exactly?
Why not post a gallery of homes within a typical reader's means or realistic aspirations, instead of a seven-bedroom mansion in Bloomfield Township and a "French country manor" in Birmingham?
Other listings are in Oakland Township, Highland and Plymouth. The smallest, a four-bedroom Bloomfield offering with 3.5 baths, has just under 4,100 square feet and is priced at $3.2 million.
Realcomp, a Realtor-owned multiple listing service in Farmington Hills, also can provide free shots of three-bedroom houses in Dearborn, St. Clair Shores, Madison Heights and Ferndale -- where Metro Times is based.
Ah, but wait -- maybe this oddity marks Half-April Fools Day, a new observance by the paper. It was posted Oct. 1, the precise midpoint between April Fools Day 2015 and 2016.
See, we're fishing for any plausible explanation other than a move by Euclid Media Group of Cleveland, the owner since December 2013, to turn MT into something it would have ridiculed just a few years ago.
