One of a Kind Bayfront Townhouse
The story behind this Sea Isle City townhouse covers a time-frame of two years. The owners of the lot and house at 4420 Venicean Road in Sea Isle City are long time friends of mine and had owned the property after a tax sale foreclosure in 2007. After about a year of owning it they decided to have me be their agent marketing the property through The Landis Co., Realtors. We listed the lot and small cottage for $1,089,000. approximately $100,000 below the assessed value. With only one serious offer with contingencies for CAFRA permits for bulkhead and docks the owners decided to get the approvals themselves in the meantime and reduced the 7300 sq ft lot to $995,000. With this being the case it was now priced in the ballpark per square foot with other sold lots on the bay front in Sea Isle City.
This is where it starts to get interesting! A couple from Pennsylvania that I met at a open house at least a year earlier expressed the interest to make a move and were open minded to what was available in Sea Isle City and Avalon. I ran into them at Mrs. Brizzles in Sea Isle and wanted me to stop by their townhouse and give them a realistic value with a fairly short quick sale. Avalon was their first choice but were surely open to a beach block or bay front property since they have a large family. We got to get to know each other quite well after weeks of spending most of the summer searching for the perfect shore place.
Blaine Steinman Designed Bayfront Townhouse
After looking at most of the existing single family homes in their price range in both Avalon and Sea Isle City I suggested looking at the lot on the bay. 4420 Venicean Road has an over-sized deep water lot that was in need of new bulkhead that the owners had a permit for. They also had the permits for two 2450 square foot twin townhouses. With an over sized lot my clients could design a one of a kind building that could be one of the nicest townhouses on the island. We spent an incredible amount of time speaking with Blaine Steinman one of the best architects in the Cape May County. Blaine designs most of the large customs houses in Avalon and Stone Harbor. If Blaine couldnt design my clients townhouse they would move on and keep looking. After two months of interviewing builders to joint venture on this project, we came up empty handed.
My clients were pushing me to sell the property and my best prospective customers were the builders and all of the local ones had been presented the opportunity with a joint venture partner or atleast a purchaser for one of the two townhouses. Everything was becoming bleak in November 2009, but after a closing on a bay front townhouse in Atlantic City I was talking to the listing agent Joel Green who had also built the property and started the conversation about this amazing property in Sea Isle City. With in minutes he said he has a builder always looking for land and was looking outside Ventnor and Margate where he has been building to spread out his investments. We schedule a meeting a few days later with John Irons, Joel Green and myself. A few days later John wanted to see a few of the new construction townhouses in Sea Isle City to compare the quality to see if he could build something that made sense. Walla, So John met with my clients at the architects office and struck a deal and began negotiating with the sellers on the lots price and terms.
Since the sellers didn’t have the permits for the docks we were at standstill in regards to the closing date because John Iron’s attorney would not close unless the permits were in place. We weren’t dealing with Sea Isle City but The State of New Jersey and anything could happen. By the time most of the terms of the contract were worked out we heard for the state that things were going to be approved. Hoping to close in February or March. As in most real estate deals these days things didn’t work out the way we wanted and now we were looking at May. ( I left out lots of the legal issues with the docks and the state leases.) The sellers agreed to let the buyers hold money in escrow until the final approvals but with little luck from the gods we closed the deal.
For more information, layouts and floorplans check out www.4420Venicean.com
Ian Lazarus,CRS
The Lazarus Team
The Landis Co., Realtors
609-457-0258
