New cottage acquisition, new blog.
I will be using this website to chronicle the renovations to the cottage, so come back often!

Greg and I just went to contract on "Sunnyside," a circa 1880s gingerbread cottage
in Bayside Village, Northport, Maine


Bayside is to the Mid-coast of Maine what Oak Bluffs is to Martha's Vineyard.

Both started out as Methodist tent-revival communities, both are now sought-after summer communities for multi-generational families and urban refugees who are looking for a quiet place to hang their hats for a week or two in August.

We are slated to close on October 2nd. I am very excited, for this is another great property to add our portfolio. Frankly, I need a project, since my business went South about the same time that Washington Mutual failed. I am going crazy trying to keep busy...but now I have to keep busy to get this place ready for the rental season next year.

I like Sunnyside for it's location. It is a well- situated cottage, having its original front doors opening onto Merithew Square with a great view towards other cute cottages.

This is the view from the front doors, the cottage second from the one on the right is now purple!

While the back of the cottage looks straight down Clinton Avenue at the Bay.

This is the view from the back deck, I have already contacted CMP so I can find out how to get the power lines buried.

The present owners expanded the cottage around 2002 and added about 200 square feet to the back of the house, facing the water, creating a really nice interior space, but giving us a challenge from the back to make the house look good.

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They did all the hard stuff: raised it on a foundation, put in new windows, tore out the interior walls and reframed the house from the interior. It is almost completely gutted, including the removal of the fireplace and the chimney.

What is on our plate now is to complete the gutting by taking out the remaining walls upstairs and the fireplace wall (non supporting) downstairs. Our plan is to open up the downstairs into more of a loftlike space so that one can see the water from the front doors. We need to insulate and rebuild the interior: New bathroom new kitchen, new walls...beadboard and v-match...to give it that cottage look. We have to repaint the exterior and landscape what bit of land there is around the house. I think the maple trees need to be trimmed out front towards the square.

The front needs a gingerbread balestrade. The corbels are painted fiberglass...they look real, and we'll probably keep them. With the new paint job, I think they will stand out so beautifully.

We will buy the place furnished, a time honored tradition in Bayside. There is a some great usable stuff in the house, but there is also a lot of stuff that can go to raise money to furnish the house in a cuter, more renter friendly manner. Like Little Bohemia it is my goal to make this house not only renter friendly, but when the time comes, turnkey seller friendly.
So, Columbus Day Weekend brings a giant estate sale to Bayside!!!

More soon!