Realty Check – Memorial Day

Ms. Tiny
Sex and the City scribe Candace Bushnell has purchased a house on Main Street in Sag Harbor for only $680,500. The tiny cottage – just 1,300 square feet – was originally built circa 1800 but was replaced by a three bedroom, two bath home in 1991. The third-acre lot contains an old barn, which is sorely in need of TLC. Perhaps there’s a Mr. Big in her life who is not averse to handiwork.

Ch Ch Changes
Son of Hamptons top broker Tim Davis, Jonathan Davis, is now with Brown Harris Stevens’ Southampton office. Says Arthur Zeckendorf, co-chair of Brown Harris Stevens: “Jonathan has a digital marketing savvy and inherited knowledge of the business.” We think real estate is in his DNA.
Christine Resnick has moved her license to Saunders. The equestrienne, who competes in the Hampton Classic, worked in digital marketing for such companies as American Express Publishing, Ann Taylor and BravoTV, before moving to the South Fork full time.

Big Flower
After debuting last summer with a capsule collection at East Hamptonites’ favorite inn, c/o The Maidstone, Big Flower founder Greg Ammon has launched a flagship store on Newtown Lane. Last season’s offerings of sunflower-print men’s swim trunks and silk pocket squares have been expanded to a full range of men’s handmade contemporary wear and Greg’s fiancé, Stacy Volkov, has collaborated on the design for the women’s collection. A wall showcases the works of local artists along with photos of the area’s landscape and Greg’s own family snapshots. Sure to be especially poignant, considering that tragically, Greg’s father, investment banker Ted Ammon, was murdered in 2001 in a notorious case in which their mother’s lover was accused of the crime. Says Ammon: “I firmly believe that in the face of adversity, the good shines through.” Amen.

Not So Sweet Home
For more than a century, a 1750 saltbox on Main Street in East Hampton has been billed as the inspiration for the popular 19th-century ditty, “Home Sweet Home.” But the sentimental notion has been dispelled. Despite prior claims, the song’s lyricist, John Howard Payne (1791-1852), never lived in the house, according to Home Sweet Home museum director Hugh King – though his mother was born in town, his father taught across the street at Clinton Academy, and his aunt once inhabited the seven-room cottage. Revisionism is underway. “The site is now less about Payne and his song, and more about Gustav and Hannah Buek, a wealthy couple from Brooklyn who purchased the house in 1907 partly because they were charmed by the “Home Sweet Home” legend, according to the New York Times.

In Like a Lamb…Out with a Lion
New real estate firm on the block Compass has continued its foray into the Hamptons by acquiring the Mrs. Condie Lamb Agency, the oldest continuously operating real estate firm in East Hampton, which was founded by Elizabeth Lamb in 1963. The boutique brokerage, which has specialized in high-end summer rentals, was helmed by Kim Hovey, who took the reins in 1994 and has now joined the Compass team. The purchase comes on the heels of a huge sale for the company – hedgefunder Scott Bommer’s three Lily Pond Lane parcels that sold for $110 million last winter. That deal was brokered by former Sotheby’s bigwig Ed Petrie, one of Compass’s high-profile recruits.

Renewal
An important local landmark, the Lyzon Hat Shop in Hampton Bays, is finally undergoing restoration after resting on steel beams for a decade. Originally a general store, the structure was built in 1896 and turned into a popular hat shop in the early 1900s where it sold hats designed and made by famous milliner Walter King. Overseen by Amagansett restorers extraordinaire, Robert Strada and Richard Ward Baxter, of Strada Baxter Design/Build, LLC, the project, which will cost just north of half a million, is slated to be finished by the end of the summer.

The Name Game
Homeowners on Bridgehampton’s Hildreth Avenue in Bridgehampton have changed the name of their historic street. According to Sandra Taylor, who led the petition to the Town of Southampton that granted the change, there are just too many roads named after Hildreth, an early local settler. Now that the number of Hildreth throughways has been reduced from eight to seven, residents of the Avenue are hoping that emergency services – and the much-needed UPS driver – will have an easier time navigating to their street. The new name is Audubon, after the ornithologist. We only counted a few roads with that name on the South Fork.

Condos or Park?
Manhattan’s Greystone Development, which owns several waterfront properties on Sag Harbor’s Ferry Road that it wants to turn into condos, has purchased another desirable parcel on up-and-coming West Water Street – that big white albatross catty-corner from the post office. The price: $4.94 million. Ryan Serhant of Nest Seekers International has been tapped to exclusively market and sell the residences. While the developers are looking to create a staggered row of houses harking back to the village’s roots as a whaling port, the Village is hoping for a public park. It is considering a proposal by village homeowner and landscape architect Edmund D. Hollander that features two beaches, a fishing and boat pier and trails.