This little cottage near the beach is located off of Quincy Shore Drive and a mile away from Marina Bay. A beautiful little area where on beautiful clear days you can see the Boston skyline and the Quincy shoreline along Wollaston Beach.
Quincy Shore Drive is a historic road in Quincy, Massachusetts. It was built in 1903 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2003. Quincy of course was the early residence of two Presidents, John Adams and John Quincy Adams. You can find Quincy's history on the official Discover Quincy website.
We accidently stumbled upon this little cottage that was for sale on a quiet post Thanksgiving drive down the shoreline to take in the fresh air one last time before winter set in. As we drove by we noticed how run down the property looked and noticed the "For Sale" sign out front. We immediately called our realtor George and when we didn't reach him we left a message for the sellers broker.
Once the appointment was made and we walked through the property, we were convinced that this little cottage was destined for a makeover from "MKE". We noticed almost immediately that the cottage had serious foundation issues and the basement had two sump pumps due to the high water table of the area. Additionally, the interior of the cottage had some serious damages that were beyond repair.
So, we put an offer on the property and closed on it mid-December.
Snow storm after snow storm prevented us from commencing work on this project but gave us some time to formulate a solid plan, review Quincy's building codes and design a modern cottage that we'd be happy to put our names on.
First up however was securing the property and avoiding winter damages so immediately after we purchased the property we called N-Star Gas to shut off the gas and take the meter away and also called the Quincy's Water Department and requested that the main water valve be shut off from the street.
The folks at the Quincy Water Department and N-Star Gas were very accommodating and they sent a crew over promptly.
Shutting the water main was a chore and a half and the crew worked for hours in the freezing cold attempting to find and turn off the water from the street. N-Star marked the ground to show where their pipes were so that the Quincy Water Department folks could dig to find the water shut off switch that was burried underground. As they began to dig they hit water at about a foot deep. It was of no surprise to us however knowing about the high water table of the area.
Follow us as we bring this neglected property back to life.
I will post a link to the before photos of the property shortly.
MKE
