This traditional-style home is located south of the highway on a road that terminates some distance away at the ocean beach.
It was built in 1995 and has an ordinary but practical design. A long front porch on the street-facing side, with gables above, forms a familiar and attractive facade.
Inside there is a double-height great room with fireplace, one bedroom downstairs, and three bedrooms upstairs. An oversized garage with space for three cars is attached. In total there is around 4,000 square feet of finished space.
As with many other properties in the Hamptons, most of the value here is in the land. This is unlike most places in the country where a property’s value is defined primarily by the structure, with the land being of relatively little value. Here the lot is 2.7 acres, and the grounds include a pool with brick patio, tennis court and koi pond.
This house last sold in 2004, almost 10 years ago, for $2.3 million. And while we seem to be leaving the 2008 crash behind us, in many markets that remain depressed houses are still selling for around 2004 prices.
Here, the current seller installed the tennis court and updated the house. That he was able to sell the house for approximately $1.3 million more 10 years later and with some improvements, is another sign of the relative strength of the market here.
The gross return of this sale was approximately 5 percent, not counting the cost of the improvements; not bad for a 9-year time period when many other homeowners saw little or no appreciation on their investments. This sale represents yet another example of the idea that in real estate we can’t predict the future but buying in a good location offers the best margin of safety.
on Mar 11, 2013