Watch as the ocean creeps in to swallow this waterfront mansion
A luxury waterfront estate worth almost $3 million has sold for less than $300,000 and extraordinary time lapse images show the pending danger that compelled the owners to sell so cheaply.
Beach erosion and the encroaching ocean is threatening to engulf the house, which sold at a clearance price of $US200,000 ($AU296,180) in the US.
Every year, the water edges closer to the Nantucket property, as the beach crumbles and drifts away. It and other homes nearby will eventually be swallowed up.
The house was once amongst acreage, alongside three neighbouring homes and near to a road. All were closer to the shore.
Those have been washed away by the Atlantic Ocean and now the sand and lapping waves are only steps from the front door, the Nantucket Current explains.
A time-lapse video on the outlet’s Instagram page documents the erosion from 1998 to 2024, featuring aerial footage of the block which has sold in the fire sale.
The news source reported the home had been valued at $US1.9 million (about $AU2.8 million) but after several storms, the shoreline is stalking ever closer, making it impossible to sell at that sum.
The owners, couple Jane Carlin and Ben Gifford, described the approaching ocean as “relentless” to the Nantucket Current. They sold to a neighbour after trying in vain to find a charity to take the home, with Carlin and Gifford offering to pay to have the dwelling moved to a safe location.
“It’s about ready to go in,” Carlin told the local news outlet. “It has really been relentless. It used to be a neighborhood, and you knew who lived where. And now, if you take a drive out there, there’s not much to see.
“All winter I had been really frantically trying to see if any of the organisations would consider taking the house and moving it, and we would help with the cost of moving.
“I didn’t want to see it fall into the ocean or get demolished. But I had no luck whatsoever.”
The couple were happy to sell to their neighbour, they told the newspaper. They did not to put it on the open market, nor dream of glossing over the predicament.
“You don’t want to sell to someone when you know a storm could take it out next week,” Carlin said. “We wanted to be ethical and honest about it. Then this miracle dropped from the sky above and we sold it to him for nothing.”
The buyer told the Nantucket Current he understands the property may only have six months left but, in the interim, he will rent it out.
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