Owner asks $1.675 million for shuttered Social House restaurant

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$25,000 for the restaurant. $1.650 million for the land. Any takers?

UPDATE (October 5, 2011): Bell Street Burritos to replace Social House

The Social House on Howell Mill Road has closed.

Lorenzo Wyche, the restaurant’s owner, closed Social House earlier this month for “minor renovations.” It never reopened.

The Shumacher Group, an Atlanta-based real estate broker, listed the restaurant for lease or sale Thursday.

Here’s pricing information from the listing:

Priced at $25,000 for all the furniture, fixtures, and equipment. Property is approximately .6/acre and is available at $1,650,000. Kick out clause of adjacent used luxury car dealer allow for allot more parking or keep as income stream. Landlord will lease restaurant and property at $3500 per month and will entertain lease/purchase scenario’s and possibly owner financing of real estate.

Wyche told What Now Atlanta in an email Thursday that The Shumacher Group has been marketing Social House for almost a year, originally priced at $225,000 for the restaurant itself.

“I was recently hospitalized and diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease and have decided to take off from restaurants for a few years and focus on my health,” Wyche said. “[The Shumacher Group] lowered the listing to $25,000 so we can just move it more quickly. The original listing was at $225,000.”

Biggest selling point? It’s “just steps away from Flip Burger Boutique and down the street from some of the most acclaimed restaurant in Atlanta,” so says the Shumacher group.

Caleb J. Spivak

Caleb J. Spivak

Caleb J. Spivak

Caleb J. Spivak

29 Responses

  1. Not to be petty, but what kind of dumdum wrote that listing? “Allot” is not a word, you don’t add an apostrophe to make a word plural, and “restaurant” should be plural. Fail.

  2. Wyche does NOT own the land, his landlord does.
    And I doubt he has any illness, he is a master liar and its probably his trick to get sympathy.
    We couldnt care less about his health! boo hoo. He owes everybody loot. Pay up, scrooge.

  3. @Clicker I am a white guy and my wife is a former boutique owner and african american woman i must sadly admit that blacks have a tendency to tear each other down. Mr. Wyche probably had no idea that attempting to become an african american themed restaurant group would be disastrous because of the consistent truism that black people are “crabs in a barrel” and will destroy businesses and communities because they have no respect for the time or work that goes into a business or community venture. I went through the same struggles trying to employ blacks and give opportunities and my business was sabotaged by the same people that I attempted to help and serve. They are lazy and are always looking for a handout. Me and my wife had very candid conversations about this topic during our venture I wondered why she catered to a clientele that wants everything for free and the employees would steal from her. Than they claim no one gives them opportunities but fail to live up to expectations when asked to do things. I would love to see someone black explain these problems.

  4. There is a history to Mr. Wyche. He either has very bad luck or he is not operating above board. Research his restaurants and you will get a clearer pictures. Rare, Harlem Bar, Social House, and sweet auburn bistro. There are probably others.

  5. Lesson learned: if you want to operate a restaurant in Atlanta, don’t use the word ‘Social’ in the name.

  6. @kwood resident;
    To the contrary I have covered Mr. Wyches’ restaurants and a google search will turn up page after page of positive glowing reviews including 3 best of atlanta awards for each of his restaurants. Mr. Wyche has done speaking engagements for Georgia State Business School and one of his businesses has been a case study at Morehouse school of business. And You will agree the 10 comments on “what now atlanta” do not make up one percent of Mr. Wyches’ restaurant customers & employees. Unfortunately there aren’t many positive comments on “what now” we love to tear into the reports like shark bait.

  7. @ observer. I’m sure you love your wife and I am sure you see her as Oprah-like and different from the rest of the blacks. But does your wife ever approach you and ask you to justify the actions of a certain segment of the white population who behave in such a manner that you have deemed the ENTIRE black race to behave? And, you want someone black to explain the problems that you said you encountered with black folks you have let into your inner circle? Sounds to me like you and your wife need to find you a new set of black friends, because I would not waste my time with those type of people, regardless of race. And remember the apple does not fall far from the tree. If your wife had a business where her staff/clientele (ie. friends/family) steal from her and want stuff for free, that speaks volumes about the type of person she is to let them get away with it then come home to you and complain about it.

  8. “has done speaking engagements for Georgia State Business School and one of his businesses has been a case study at Morehouse?”
    For what?????????
    How do operate illegally?
    How to dodge taxes?
    How to run a restaurant without AC?
    How to serve food out of cans?
    How to give Atlanta the worst service possible?
    -take your pick.

  9. I am hoping for a better restaurant to open in its place. Something open past lunchtime too, please. There are too many brunch/lunch-only places in this part of town, and some of us DO live out here.

  10. Oh, he certainly could use the money. His company is in three lawsuits and he has been in a divorce for four years now. Sounds like a model businessman for business schools to highlight.

  11. It sounds like Lorenzo needs to spend some time down at the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church with Bishop Eddie L. Long and First Lady Vanessa Long. Eddie has all kinds of interesting parlor tricks that Lorenzo might enjoy.

  12. So I would like to pass along some information I posted a review of ‘RARE’ back in Jan 2010. As you can read on Yelp.com, I visited RARE, and I didn’t have a good experience. I had a very horrible one, so bad that I posted that experience on YELP.com. Because that is one of the reasons YELP.com is here, to tell the good and the bad. Yelp in there own words says:

    Yelp is all about the power of word-of-mouth amplified. Our growing online community wants to hear the real story about everything local, from you and your friends. So feel free to share your insider tips, warn others about bad experiences, and help folks who are new in town.

    To continue this nightmare of an experience, the owner (Lorenzo Wyche) emailed me the following, he called it ‘you’re a d**k head:

    Lorenzo Wyche wrote
    “You’re a d**k head and a coward. keep your janky ass out of my restauarant. a** hole. your business isnt wanted and you can keep your broke ass in decatur”

    RE: your a d**k head
    Lorenzo Wyche wrote
    “Like I said If you dont like rare dont complain about it just dont go there. I will put that on yelp, ajc or wherever. and tell whoever. my business is doing great in fact my business is doing great all over the east coast, middle east & carribean. thats none of your business. your not an expert you dont even have the pedigree to talk about design. Somebody needs to let you know it aint sweet over here. If you wanna talk shit be prepared to get shit back.
    yeah i said it.”

    RE: your a d**k head
    Lorenzo Wyche wrote
    “I dont were you are from decatur or whatever but where im from dont talk shit. and thats all you were doing was talking shit. And that has nothing to do with my restaurant as much as it does have something to do with you and how miserable you are. you can send whatever you want to whoever you want. but if you got the balls to start taking jabs at somebody than you better expect some back. and stop whining about it.”

    These are the emails that I received from the owner of the restaurant, the owner! Now as I see it, Yelp.com is a great place to tell business owners the good and the bad. It is up to that business owner to do something about it. If you have problems in your business, as we all do (from time to time). It is up to you as a business owner to correct those problems. The stuff that I didn’t like at the restaurant is correctable. Bad service, bad food and I guess from the tone of the owner just all around bad attitudes.

    I was going to just leave this alone, but I don’t believe the owner understands the consumer market. If you are having a hard time in business now, do you think sending an email like that to a customer would help your cause? As a consumer, I do have choices, and I choose to give your business a chance. Now to address some issues:

    1. If the owner wants more business, take care of the people that do come to the place
    2. If you can’t run a business don’t open one. Consumers control the flow of money in and out of your business and you just don’t understand that. We have power and choices now.
    3. Adjust your attitude, because today you made me mad, tomorrow maybe you insult a newspaper writer.
    4. If you want people to talk good about your business, do good business.

    I think I have said my peace, but I see others have posted their bad experience with RARE, why would you point me out as the bad guy, when it is clear your bad business was affected others. My posted wasn’t trying to drag your business down; you are doing a good job at that yourself. And by the way you own a restaurant and you misspelled that in your email.

  13. Yelp rocks my socks.

    Did you hear about the time Rare burned down, because of “a candle”? Yeah!

    Ask Mr. Wyche about the big deck he built at Social house without obtaining any of the required permits first, only to have to tear it all down! Classic!

  14. Yelp? Yelp is pathetic. If you write reviews on Yelp, you know almost nothing about food or the industry. It’s for 20 yr old somethings with little to no money writing what little they know about food for attention. It’s almost embarrassing to read about their vast knowledge of cooking techniques or international cuisine, what lack of it. Yelpers give Arby’s 5 stars. That says it all.

    PS- Social House was absolutely horrid. Waffle House laughed at them.

  15. Lot of hater’s on this site. I’ve lived here almost all my life and Social House was the best breakfast I’ve ever had here.

    And for @observer that was talking about hiring black’s. Dude. You are a horrible manager and bad at hiring people. Lazy doesn’t come in a color and it’s obvious that you don’t know
    how to build a great business with talented staff regardless of their individuality.

    Atlanta: The city to busy to hate (except for @observer).

    j

  16. This place had so much potential, with some sacrifice, I could have owned this place and had it running right. I served here, and sadly The Social House had faithful guest who came every Saturday even when we had no food (one morning we just had eggs and pancakes.smh). Lorenzo had great servers and Chef Ken was a beast when it came to cooking. If I were the owner I would have renovated the bathrooms, fix the A.C, train my chefs to have the food come out in 12 minutes or less, take care of my staff, have everything on my menu…especially on holidays, Saturday and Sunday mornings and BE THERE WHEN SHIT WENT WRONG, AND FIX IT. I know, easier said than done, but it can be done. I wish I had the money to buy this place and the right´s to the menu, because The Social House HAS potential, just needs the right owner. Lorenzo, if your reading this, I am grateful for the employment in the past, I hope you get well.

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