A Ridgewood, N.J., Tudor listed by Beth Freed of Prominent Properties Sotheby's International Realty included an elevator. The homeowners use as a linen closet.
Old bomb shelters are sometimes converted into wine cellars. But Ruby and Bobby Kaplan of Teaneck store old clothes, toys, and household items in theirs. In Bobby Kaplan's words, it's "a nice, cool place for junk."
The shelter is a surprise in the Kaplans' large stucco house, which has been so extensively renovated it looks nearly new. (The seven-bedroom home is on the market for just under $1.5 million.)
The Cold War hideout has thick concrete walls and a 21/2-foot-diameter corrugated-metal tunnel, which leads beneath the lawn to the outside. Bobby Kaplan recalls that when the couple first moved into the house, he was in the yard with the dog when the dog suddenly vanished. He had fallen into the bomb shelter's tunnel, which the family later closed up.
Nickie Lisella's Allendale, N.J., house also came with a bomb shelter.
"I thought it was cool when we first saw it," said Lisella, a manager with Terrie O'Connor Realtors in Allendale. "I figured if anyone dropped a bomb, we could save our family."
Buyers often are drawn to extra spaces, especially if they are big enough for a variety of uses. Ann Matri, a Coldwell Banker agent in Saddle River, N.J., recently listed an 1890 two-bedroom house in Midland Park that sold almost immediately and over asking price, largely because it included a small backyard stone building with a potbellied stove.
It was originally a summer kitchen, used when it was too hot to cook indoors. The buyer plans to use the space, roughly 12 feet by 14 feet, as an art studio.
"I advertised it for hobbyists, artists, musicians," Matri said. "I can't tell you how many people came. A lot of people like to have some sort of studio or a little privacy."
