Saunders Office Rises In East Hampton

Saunders and Associates’ new East Hampton office on Montauk Highway is rising quickly. By late last the structure was nearly fully framed. It will be the third Saunders location on the East End, in addition to the firm’s leased space on Main Street in Southampton and its Main Street building in Bridgehampton.

On Main Street in East Hampton Village there are eight real estate agencies: Town and Country, Douglas Elliman, Sotheby’s International, Corcoran, Halstead, Nestseekers, Main Street Properties, and Brown Harris Stevens. This is the most of any of the villages in East Hampton and Southampton towns.

Saunders purchased two lots at 24 and 26 Montauk Highway last year. At the beginning of this year, it submitted an application to the East Hampton Town Planning Board to expand the existing 3,266-square-foot structure, which used to be home to an antiques store and a plumbing contractor.

The initial application was to add a second story of 2,687 square feet, but the Planning Board limited that to 2,000 square feet for a final structure of just over 5,000 square feet. The board noted in a memo that this expansion was not the result of a transfer of 2,000 square feet of density from the adjacent vacant lot, but “the ability of the applicant to expand a preexisting, nonconforming use in accordance with the Town Code.”

Theresa Quigley, former East Hampton Town councilwoman, is to manage the new offices. Ms. Quigley joined the town board in 2010 and was appointed deputy supervisor. Last year, she left the public sector to become part of the Saunders team as the executive managing director and general counsel.

In the meantime, Sotheby’s International is likely to set up shop on Main Street in Sag Harbor. In an unofficial poll, members of the Sag Harbor Village Zoning Board of Appeals approved a request for a change of use of an office space on 35 Main Street, which had previously been the offices of the Sag Harbor Express. There are currently five real estate offices on Sag Harbor’s Main Street: Corcoran, Brown Harris Stevens, Strough, Douglas Elliman, and Simon Harrison.