It's weird how things work this way. Just last week I was driving up McKinney Avenue and a traffic light stopped me right in front of House 34. There were two people on the porch, which is more or less the number of customers I saw enjoying themselves every time I passed the restaurant. I wondered aloud how the place was staying open. Turns out, it's not.
If the For Lease banner hanging from the pergola doesn't say it clearly enough, the letter taped to the door does. House 34 closed this week. The notice cited more than $24,000 in back rent and fees.
According to the notice, the landlord had been using the restaurant's security deposit to cover previous rent defaults, so House 34's demise has been in the making for a while. Empty patios translate to empty bank accounts, apparently.
The restaurant was opened by Sbeity Investment Inc., after Patio Grill closed in the same place. Sbeity worked the place over from top to bottom, so prospective tenants will have a recently renovated property to consider. It would be great to see something ethnic drop into the space -- something akin to Monkey King Noodle Co., in Deep Ellum, but that remains to be seen. It's a nice-looking patio, though, so I don't see it staying empty for long.
