Here’s a fixer-upper with a difference… This Cold War-era radar tower on the Washington coast has gone on sale for $1.5m.

It might be rough around the edges but the 6-storey concrete building in Bay Horizon Park – once the Blaine Air Force Station – offers views across to the San Juan islands and Vancouver.

Commercial real-estate broker Mike Paul bought the defunct radar tower from the state in 2003 for $125,000.

‘It was different,’ he told The Bellingham Herald. ‘That was the main thing. I like stuff that’s different.’

A 70-tonne rotating radar once the crowned the tower, built in 1961. Paul had plans to turn the building’s roof into ‘a large residence, all glass, like a greenhouse’, but they never came to fruition.

He set up a makeshift home on the fifth floor, equipped with a bed, TV and a wood heater. Other floors are currently filled with items he has collected, including Thai rugs, decorative wineglasses and sports shirts. Paul estimates there are between 200,000 to 300,000 objects, which he plans to auction off if the building is sold.

What the radar tower lacks in windows, it makes up for in ceiling heights, with each of the floors ranging from 14 to 30 ft tall. And future owners will have no earthquake fears, thanks to the one-foot-thick walls, reinforced with rebar.

‘Let your imagination run wild you,’ suggests the listing on Windermere Real Estate. ‘[You] could convert [it] to a doomsday shelter and high end home.’

Indeed.