Homes near ocean risk losing value, even in a hot market
Real estate broker Jim McGue expects to soon list for sale a home off Quincy Shore Drive, a location whose top selling point would normally be its front-row water views.
Real estate broker Jim McGue expects to soon list for sale a home off Quincy Shore Drive, a location whose top selling point would normally be its front-row water views. But the low-lying street also took the brunt of a number of recent nor’easters, and McGue said the owners told him their backyard was inundated during one storm in March — the worst flooding in their 25 years there.
“It’s been a challenge along the Quincy waterfront,” said McGue, who owns Granite Group Realtors in Quincy. “People got flooded and are fighting with the insurance company, and they want to sell the house. What happened here in March certainly underscores what a 100-year flood map is all about. Quincy Shore Drive was closed — I’ve never seen it closed since the Blizzard of ’78.”
The roads are dry now, and all along Massachusetts’ coastline cleanups are mostly complete. But as the spring real estate season blooms, the memory of the storms hangs over waterfront and water-view properties that otherwise would command premium prices. With rates for flood insurance already sky-high, and concern about global warming and rising sea levels more widespread, some prospective buyers are weighing whether it’s worth it to live at the ocean’s edge, real estate agents say.
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