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I DON’T OFTEN PICK UP those glossy real estate brochures you see piles of on Main Street in East Hampton. They feature mostly multi-million dollar properties, not the sad fixer-uppers I’m interested in.
However, I did grab one the other day, and there on a back page were two side-by-side cottages in a low-key area of Amagansett that I just love: Lazy Point, where the sky is big, the vegetation is scrubby and piney, and the lapping waters of Napeague Bay are right there.
One of them appealed more than the other — the cedar-shingled one with a deck that reminds me fondly of Fire Island (asking 425K), below — and I called about it right away. Naturally it’s gone to contract.
The property next door (owned by the same family), top three photos, is still available at 450K. That one has no curb appeal whatsoever; it’s shingled with the rigid asbestos tiles that were so popular in the ’50s, and is just a box.
Still, I made the field trip yesterday, when 8″ of weekend snow had melted and been washed away by Monday’s rains. I had to see if regret was in order on cottage #1, and whether cottage #2 had possibilities. The answers are no and maybe.
I loved the drive out there, about 20 minutes from my home in Springs (and 20 minutes further from NYC), dipping through pine woods and meadows. I turned onto Mulford Lane, and drove along it toward the bay, looking for the addresses. As I got closer and closer to the water, I got excited… this is really good! Then I realized that too close to the water is not a good thing on Mulford Lane. The last two houses, below, once inhabitable, are now in the water and boarded up, and the beach at the end of the road is sand-bagged against further encroachment. These are maybe 8 or 10 houses in, which seems far enough to be safe from flooding, for my lifetime at least.
#1 (the cedar-shingled one) is smaller than it looks in the brochure — quite tiny, at 500 square feet — and I put that out of my head. #2 (the nondescript white one) is slightly larger, 700 square feet. It has nothing — nothing — to recommend it architecturally. It’s hard to see how it could be charmed up, though I daresay the editors of the late Domino magazine could do it. I didn’t see the interiors, but as the listing agent, JF Kuneth of DevlinMcNiff put it, “It’s very Grandma.” As such, it only garners about $11,000 a season in rental income — potentially $15-18,000 after those Domino editors get through with it.
No add-on building is possible, because it’s a flood zone. Not even a deck. There’s a cute old shed at the back, large enough for a guest bed.
And of course, at a 450K price point, which must seem completely nuts to those in the heartland (anywhere except perhaps California, that is), it’s top o’ the market. But then, the one next door was snapped up quickly, assuming the sale goes through.
I’m going to pass and continue my search. If you feel differently, go here for the listing, and give JR a call (631/324-6100 x 354, wkuneth@halstead.com).
To read about my discovery of Lazy Point two summers ago, and see lots of cute beach cottages, go here.
LIVING THE COUNTRY LIFE, and loving it. I came out to my East Hampton cottage shortly after New Years, with an open return ticket back to New York City. Twelve days later, I’m still here. In my cottage in the woods, I feel relaxed and contented. As long as there’s this thing called the Internet, I’m productive too. What seems to surprise people is that I’m never bored or lonely.
I mean, who wouldn’t love a place where the police blotter, as reported in the East Hampton Star, includes the following items:
- A man driving a Toyota pickup filled with debris drove over the scales at the recycling center on Springs Fireplace Road but didn’t pay for dumping.
- A man asked to remove his boat from a slip at the dock at Gann Road told police he had permission to keep his boat there and “would not be removing it any time soon.”
- A woman told police her vehicle was scratched on its driver’s side while parked at the Circle.
- Police confiscated a mountain bike left on the sidewalk outside the EH Fire Department.
And my favorite by far:
- A swan was spotted running loose on Main Street near Buell Lane. By the time police arrived, the swan was on the village green and out of the road.
I’ve easily kept busy puttering around the house; raking leaves off the lawn just to “get my blood moving,” as my friend Lula would say; perfecting my winter soup recipes; watching MSNBC obsessively; and, on one annoying occasion, driving to Sag Harbor for an advertised estate sale, only to find this:
I kept up my local gym routine, went to Gurney’s Inn in Montauk for a facial and got a glimpse of the ocean (still there), and did a little bit of browsing the shops in Amagansett. My favorite antique store there has to be Nellie’s. If I was spending $2,500 on art right now, I would buy the group of 1940s family portraits in oil, below.
I also made plans for a new kitchen counter to be installed, replacing, at long last, the Formica one that was here when I bought this cottage in 2009. After considering and rejecting all the other options, I’ve settled on a new countertop of 6″x6″ white, matte ceramic tiles. That job begins tomorrow, and since I’ll be without a functioning kitchen for a few days, I am heading back tomorrow to the rough-and-tumble urban world (oh, how I’ve missed the Flatbush Avenue bus).
The heavenly tented pool pavilion
I COULD GO IN AND OUT of grand oceanfront estates all day long, then come back to my humble cottage and still be happy with the place. I can wander five hedged, manicured, topiaried, statued, fountained acres and admire them, but not care a whit that they don’t belong to me.
Anthropomorphic boxwoods greet you at the gravel parking court
But Sunday I visited an Amagansett garden newly added to the Garden Conservancy’s Open Days program and came away wanting to weep.
Perennial beds on a central axis of brick pathways near the property’s entrance
This one is a mere one-third of an acre, surrounding a cedar-shingled cottage with muted green trim.
Tall, columnar Leyland cypresses are dramatic punctuation marks
Yet it has so many nooks and aspects, separated by specimen evergreens and Japanese maples, and blooming profusely in mid-July with tropical-colored cannas, day lilies, fuchsias, and more, it seems much larger, and decidedly un-boring.
Poolside cannas in bloom
A shady back corner with Solomon’s seal, white hydrangeas
The design works such popular cottage-garden features as rustic arbors and a brick-paved entry patio centered on an iron urn, to magical effect.
Day lilies, a dwarf Japanese maple on the pool patio
Masterminded by Victoria Fensterer, a garden designer based in East Hampton, it is dense with plants, but with such a clear structure that it feels not overstuffed but simply abundant.
There’s a small, irregularly shaped lawn, surrounded by tall evergreens and old cedars, so that the edges of the property are blurred and seemingly non-existent.
Dense shrubbery visually expands the boundaries of the small lot
Steps made of massive slabs of stone lead to a naturalistic pool with river stones in place of the usual coping.
Stone steps lead to a free-form pool
And then there’s that piece de resistance, a pool pavilion in the form of a draped, circus-like 
tent — a festive bit of exoticism on Long Island’s often terribly-traditional East End.
WANT TO RENT my bright and comfortable 1940s cedar-shingled cottage in Springs, N.Y. (5 miles north of East Hampton village) August 1-31? It’s on a landscaped half-acre with a view into peaceful woods from the back deck.
The house is half a mile – a 10 minute walk, 5 minute bike ride, or 2 minute drive –from the beautiful, unspoiled, never-crowded Maidstone Beach on Gardiner’s Bay.
- 2BR (one full bed, two twins), 1 bath
- High ceilings, skylights, screened porch, huge deck, best outdoor shower ever
- ½ mile to Maidstone Beach, 1 mile to Louse Point (another spectacular beach on Accabonac Harbor). Superb swimming, kayaking, paddleboarding, etc.
- 5 miles to ocean beaches at East Hampton and Amagansett
-Under 1 mile to Springs Historic District, including Jackson Pollock-Lee Krasner House and Springs General Store
- 10 minutes East Hampton Village, 10 minutes Amagansett, 20 minutes Sag Harbor, 25 minutes Montauk (restaurants, bars, stores, art galleries, historic houses, movies, etc.)
- 2-1/4 hours from NYC, barring traffic
- Washer-dryer in basement
- Flat-screen TV, DVD player, Wi-Fi, printer, iPod dock
- A/C in living room, ceiling fans in LR and MBR
- $7,000 August 1-31
To see more photos, go here. Email caramia447@gmail.com if interested in renting, or for more information. Thanks!
AN ITEM ON CURBED HAMPTONS, the real estate gossip site that is the Brownstoner of the East End, caught my attention this week: a 4BR, 4 bath Amagansett house on 3/4 acre, newly on the market for $2.2 million. It looks attractive enough, with its French doors and patio, but it would not have drawn my scrutiny if the address hadn’t sounded familiar: 1 Cranberry Hole Road, near the intersection of the new and old Montauk Highways — rather too close to the intersection if you ask me <sniff>, but set well back from the road.
I remember well the long driveway, because I went to a yard sale there when I first bought my house a few miles away in ’09. Back then, the house looked like this:
The interior was dark and dreary, and I recall stressed but kind people dealing with overflowing boxes of videotapes and other junk, who gave me a rusted wrought iron bench which now sits on my front deck. I offered a few bucks, but they insisted on giving it to me, so eager were they to get rid of things. That’s why I remember the house at all.
At the time, I most definitely did not think, “Ooh, I’d love to buy this place, fix it up, and flip it for 2 million dollars!” But Katie Brown did, and did, paying $500,000 for it in March 2010, banging out a reno in a mere 15 months, and putting it right back on the market. That’s why she’s Katie Brown.
Katie Brown is a “lifestyle expert” and TV personality, a smaller-scale Martha Stewart, with long-running cooking and decorating shows that have been on Lifetime, A&E, and PBS (I’ve never seen them — as with Oprah, I know her career only through print media), several books, and a line of bedding and bath linen for Meijer, a chain of Midwest department stores. With her husband, William Corbin, a digital media exec, she’s renovated several houses on the cheap and a shade too trendily, including a Brooklyn brownstone, which I’m guessing is their primary residence; a Berkshires cabin that was written up in The New York Times; and another couple of places in the Hamptons which have been covered in sadly now-defunct decorating magazines.
Whether they originally bought the Amagansett house as a flipper is unclear. I’m guessing that was always the intention. In Katie’s own blog from the early spring of 2010, she called it a “weekend retreat” — but apparently not for her own family.
This is how I remember the house looking from the yard sale (these pictures are from Katie’s blog, with temporary furnishings– you can now see the dining table and chairs outdoors on the patio in the current real estate listing):
Here’s what Katie saw in the c.1980 ugly duckling: “Although its grey exterior might appear to be a little drab, I think its what lies inside that matters most. Decades of history embedded in dated wallpaper, beautiful wood paneling in the main living room, sliding doors galore, and a backyard that looks like extends to the depths of eastern Long Island. As the weeks progress I plan on remodeling the entire house, and transforming this place into a summer retreat.”
This is the newly whitewashed, vastly improved main living space as styled for sale:
The enterprising couple hit all the Hamptons real-estate tropes with their reno.
Set down a long private driveway…a chef’s gourmet kitchen with serious appliances…open living room, beamed ceilings with a fireplace… surrounded by French doors… garden courtyard…charming outbuildings, one an art studio…heated gunite pool… lush lawn….
Well, really, what could be bad, when you put it that way?
Former master bedroom, below
New master
Kitchen before
Kitchen after. I just have to go on record saying I don’t like the kitchen at all. Shiny black tiles combined with rustic wood? No! And the placement of the refrigerator looks plain wrong.
New dining room, below. I recognize the farmhouse table and graphic poster from another house.
New bath
Do I sound a little sour grapes? I don’t mean to. I’m full of admiration for clever, energetic, talented people who don’t give a damn about the received wisdom that ‘it’s not a good time’ in the real estate market, and hope they make a tidy sum.
What’s a Hamptons house without a pergola?
I just wonder whether they know anymore: What is real life and what is staging?
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