House Joins Parade of History : Urban renewal: Older homes scheduled for demolition are sold cheaply to residents in exchange for a commitment to relocate and restore the structures.

ANAHEIM —  Ron and Bettyjack Waltz watched anxiously as a huge truck lugged their new house across railroad tracks and into the last vacant lot on Vintage Lane.

“I used to live in a house like this,” said Ron Waltz as the dilapidated two-story, wood-frame home inched toward its destination.

As part of a city-sponsored effort to preserve a downtown neighborhood, older homes scheduled for demolition were sold cheaply to residents in exchange for a commitment to move and restore the structures. The city offered low-interest loans to residents to help pay for the process.

This was the fifth such home on Vintage Lane; the other four have already been restored to mint condition.

About 17 years ago, the city began razing its downtown in hope that the vacant lots would attract developers. Many older homes were lost, but a few were saved.

“It’s just a means of preserving some of Anaheim’s past,” said Tom Kupfrian, project coordinator for the city redevelopment agency.

“This is really the cream of the crop,” he said of homes on Vintage Lane.

The Waltzes home was moved from nearby 206 N. Olive St. and is the last one to come to Vintage Lane. The house is next to a Victorian Dutch colonial home that their son, Ron Jr., bought and moved three years ago.

The senior Waltz raved about the huge basement the old house will sit on, as well as the wine cellar, fruit and vegetable storage room and gymnasium that will one day be there. It will take Ron Waltz and his son about a year to restore the 1905 Revival-style house.

But for them, getting the house to that point is half the fun. “We’re trying to create something here,” Ron Waltz Jr. said. “That’s the neat thing about it.”

A few neighbors, friends and city officials watched as the moving team slowly tugged the home to its new address.

“It’s so reminiscent of times past,” said Jean Matkin, a friend of the Waltzes. “I think it gives us a sense of where we’ve been and where we’re going.”