New life for 19th-century Cold Spring Harbor home

Last year, when Bobby Brahms first saw it, the storied 19th century house in Cold Spring Harbor looked beyond repair. The cedar clapboard was peeling, the porch was in shambles, the soffits were rotting, and windowpanes were missing. The house had no heating, no working bathroom or no kitchen fixtures. "A lot of people would have walked away," Brahms says. "Local builders wouldn't touch it."

But beneath the shabby facade, Brahms envisioned a glimmer of its former grandeur. Built in 1850, the house on Goose Hill Road had been the home of sea captain Joseph T. Bunce Jr. and it had remained in his family for more than 150 years. With its decorative ornamentation and stately windows, it had reflected the historic prosperity of the former whaling village and prominent seaport. The house is on both the local historic register and the National Register of Historic Places.

But the house had fallen on bad times. When Bunce's granddaughter, who was its last inhabitant, died in 1997 at the age of 84 she left no will, and a deed was not found. The house sat vacant for more than 12 years while the sale of the property dragged through a lengthy legal process to clear the way for a sale.

Finally, in 2009, the family was able to sell, enabling Brahms, a developer, and business partner David Ney to purchase the antique home at auction for $310,500 and begin restoring it. A team of craftsmen spent the past nine months restoring and polishing original artifacts where they could and replacing and rebuilding where they couldn't.

Nearly finished now, the house is on the market for $1.298 million.

While there were discouraging moments along the way, Brahms and his partner got a break in December when they began tearing branches and debris off the facade, says architect Anthony J. Musso of Cold Spring Harbor, who drew documents for the project. Despite all the rotted material, he says, the structure was actually in better shape than they'd originally thought.

A consultant's aid

The developers sought the assistance of restoration experts and Huntington Town historian Robert C. Hughes. The original wavy glass, including that on the first floor floor-to-ceiling window panels, was able to be polished and preserved. And so began a project that is generous with authentic details.

The wide mahogany banister at the entry was sanded and polished to a handsome sheen. Molding was painstakingly removed from door frames by Franklin Square-based master carpenter Frank Bermudez, who stripped the wood and reinstalled it, matching it exactly if pieces were missing.

Surrounding each doorway, 27 separate pieces of wood impart a rich, heavy antique molding. Most of the rooms also have original wood doorknobs that were cleaned and polished, and their mechanisms repaired when necessary. White Spruce wide-plank floors were restored to their original dark patina.

Surprise, surprise

The process was not without its daunting moments. One of the most challenging came when contractors found no insulation in any of the plaster walls. Instead, inside each wall, they found brick noggin, a brick and mortar structure wedged between the timbers that offered basic insulating properties. Some of it was crumbling.

They were faced with a dilemma. One choice was to take down the exterior siding to insulate; the other was to remove the plaster walls and fill with high-performance insulation. They chose the latter. It was a good choice. Outside, the Western Red Cedar clapboard siding in the front and the wider shiplap wood plank in the rear beautifully depict 19th century style. Brahms was able to restore and paint nearly all the Eastern White Pine shiplap, leaving slightly imperfect planks for a timeworn feel.

Of course, the house has been retrofitted with modern conveniences, including a gourmet kitchen with a wood-burning fireplace, two gas-burning fireplaces and a master-bedroom suite with a white Carrera marble bath with a cast-iron claw-foot tub. All the infrastructure is new.

What it is worth

WHAT Restored 1850 sea captain's home with three to five bedrooms and 21/2 baths on a half-acre lot at 38 Goose Hill Rd. in Cold Spring Harbor

PRICE $1.298 million

TAXES $6,700

INFO Contact Barbara Grego at 516-523-4269 or barbs76@aol .com; http://38goosehillrd.com

The back story

When Capt. Joseph Bunce's granddaughter, Estelle Raynor, died in 1997, she left no will, and there was no deed because she had been the third generation to live continuously in the house since 1868. She had no children and no direct heirs.

At the time of her death, many family members came forward with an interest in the estate. Huntington attorney Deborah Dobbin, who represented the estate's heir, a cousin named Audrey Newman, says 31 family members surfaced through an extensive genealogy search - and that wasn't the only issue that convoluted the process and threatened the very survival of the house.

Because no deed of record existed, the property could not be sold until all interested parties were contacted and the title was cleared.

In 2002, Dobbin commenced a partition action, a legal proceeding to clear the title. But by this time, kin were scattered across the country - from Ohio to North Carolina to California.

After research determined the Bunce lineage, Dobbin spent years corresponding and communicating with numerous family members in an effort to sell the house.

During these years, some of the interested parties died, including Newman, and their heirs substituted. While court proceedings and many motions to clear the title continued, the house could not be sold.

"The house was becoming dilapidated, subject to vandals and squatters," Dobbin says. "We were worried there'd be no house to sell."

After eight years in court, the house's fate was to be sold at auction. By then, "it was in everyone's best interest to get it sold," Dobbin says.

The property sold in "as is" condition in September 2009 for $310,500. After taxes, liens and other fees were satisfied, the court determined the respective interests using genealogy tables. Some of the more distant kin got shares as low as .625 percent, Dobbin says.

Yet, while the inheritance may not have been huge, she adds, the payoff was high: The true legacy of the Bunce house will remain because "it is restored to its original splendor."

Whether you are a history buff who appreciates wide plank floors or you like to dabble in restoring antique homes, buying an old home requires savvy. Those who have done it caution that it can be risky.

Here are some recommendations from the restorers of this Goose Hill Road property.

Tips for buying an old home

1. Get it cheap
"That's a given," developer Bobby Brahms says. He and his partner combed through lists of properties for sale, looking for the right one. They subscribe to a service that lists foreclosures for auction and scour real estate listings for bank-owned or distressed sales. It's a treacherous market because you never know what you are getting.

2. Buy unique
A property with distinguishing characteristics has potential to bring more return on investment. It's a characteristic of all of Brahms' projects, such as an ongoing development of an unusually large plot of 11 homes on open-bay Seaford waterfront.

3. Look for a firm foundation
If the four walls are solid, it's an easy matter to replace floor beams. That was the case with this home. After consulting with a structural engineer, the developers beefed up the floor by "sistering" the beams - that is, placing heavy support beams next to the originals.

4. Keep it dry
Make sure the roof is sound and leak-free and that there aren't signs of mold. If the roof has been watertight, the walls remain dry and durable.

5. Sharpen your pencil
Figure the basics for kitchens and baths, a roof and other necessities, as well as hidden costs such as how many cubic feet of Dumpsters are needed to cart away waste. Then build in a contingency fund for the items that may arise unexpectedly.

6. Expect the unexpected
When the demolition was under way at the Goose Hill property, the contractors opened up a wall and discovered brick noggin, a layer of brick and mortar between timbers that served as insulation. "We had to remove portions that were unstable," Brahms says, "at additional expense."

7. Save your receipts
The federal government extended its energy efficiency tax credits for most homeowners through the end of 2010. Installation costs are included in some cases. Tax credit is 30 percent of cost of the home improvement, up to $1,500.

8. Be dedicated
"I knew it would be difficult, but it was little more difficult than I thought," Brahms says. As far as profit, at the outset, "I thought we would have made a lot more." But as the project went along, he says he increasingly wanted to maintain authenticity and avoided cutting corners. To make a restoration work, "it has to be a labor of love," Brahms concludes.