Courtesy / Re/Max By the Bay
The pier, breakwater, and barracks (in the foreground) were part of U.S. Navy installations on Long Island.
March 31, 2021
An old Navy site on Casco Bay will go to auction
Courtesy / Re/Max By the Bay
Outlined here are three parcels on Long Island to be auctioned through a partnership between Re/Max By the Bay and Tranzon Auction Properties.
A brokerage is partnering with an auction house to try to move along the sale of an 11.3-acre Long Island waterfront property that served as part of a base for the U.S. Navy during World War II.
The property has seen two price reductions over the past year. Re/Max By the Bay brought in Tranzon Auction Properties to auction 295 Island Ave., on the southwestern shore of the Casco Bay island.
Bidding opens April 29 at 1 p.m. and closes May 6 at 1 p.m., according to a news release.
The sale includes three contiguous parcels.
- A 3-acre upland lot offers views of Casco Bay and has an 11,000-square-foot, two-story building formerly used as a Navy barracks.
- A 2.4-acre waterfront lot has 750 feet of shore frontage, a 110-foot wharf on pilings, and a 435-foot stone breakwater.
- A 5.9-acre submerged land lot, once used to moor Navy small boats, lies between the breakwater and the shoreline.
Dual strategy
The property is near the island’s public ferry and water taxi dock and a short boat ride from the Portland waterfront. Long Island, like five others in the bay, is served by the Casco Bay Lines Ferry System with regular year-round passage to and from downtown Portland.
“We have known and worked with the team at Tranzon Auction Properties for many years,” David Banks, owner of Re/Max By The Bay in Portland, said in the release. “It’s such a value for our clients to be able to provide the auction selling process as a resource.”
Marketing through Tranzon expands the customer base, Re/Max listing coordinator Peter Blake told Mainebiz.
“They have a different reach than we do,” he said. “It’s a great working partnership.”
The dual marketing strategy is similar for this property, Mike Carey, Tranzon’s senior vice president of sales, told Mainebiz by email.
“The property is available for purchase and the asking price on the Re/Max listing is $2.095 million,” Carey explained. “That is not the opening bid at the auction. The auction bidding will commence at a very low number — $50,000 — and bidders will competitively establish the high bid.”
The seller is an estate special administrator whose goal is to convert the property into dispersible funds to the property’s heirs, Carey said.
“For the community as a whole — this is a prominent property,” he continued. “It's located just west of the ferry terminal and is extremely visible. As a gateway property it's been sitting fallow for many years.
Hard to value
Banks said he and his team have marketed the property for about a year and have had conversations with interested parties. Potential buyers don’t need to wait for the auction, he added.
“At the same time, it’s important to our client, the seller, and the Long Island community as a whole that this premiere property gets sold and the auction will ensure that happens,” he said.
Tom Saturley, Tranzon’s president, said the company will promote the property throughout the country.
“Real estate auctions shine for properties like this — iconic, unique and hard to value,” Saturley said in the release. “It’s a great opportunity for real estate developers, marine-related businesses, marina developer and other investors. It’s the classic example of ‘They’re not making more of it’ and therefore it’s a valuable asset.”
According to zillow.com, the property was listed on the market in 2017 by another brokerage firm for $3.65 million.
It was delisted, then listed by Re/Max in January 2020 for $2.85 million. The price was dropped twice last year and now stands at $2.095 million.
Destination
Re/Max By The Bay took on the listing shortly before the start of the pandemic, which subsequently slowed the marketing process, Blake said. Queries picked up over the summer and ramped up further during the winter, he said.
“I’ve been out there for a couple of showings,” he added.
Queries have come in from potential buyers around New England and one from Michigan, he continued. When the agency first listed the property, Blake said, he called some owners of small businesses, such as restaurants in the area, that he thought might be a good fit.
“It’s a great destination,” he said. “One selling point is that it faces west and you have the sunset and it’s protected from the wind.”
Naval hub
The property was a component of the naval operations that occurred on Long Island during World War II.
According to a 2015 article by Edgar Allen Beem in the Island Journal, the installation is just part of the abandoned buildings, bunkers, and bases left on some of Maine’s islands after World War II.
“Long Island was the hub of naval activities in the bay, home to the U.S. Navy Fuel Annex, Torpedo Control Officers School, and the U.S. Naval Air Facility Casco Bay,” Beem wrote.
Some of the Long Island installations were since repurposed for commercial and municipal uses, he wrote.
With upland, waterfront and submerged land, it’s an unusual piece of real estate that could invite various levels of development and even be split as separate sales, Blake said.
The barracks is a large wooden structure on a hill. Its interior is gutted. Some potential buyers have considered repurposing it for condominiums, said Blake.
Photo / Maureen Milliken
A former barracks, long vacant, is one of many vestiges of the Navy left on Long Island.
The seller is willing to separate the upper lot, with the barracks, from the lower waterfront and submerged lots for separate sales, he added. The waterfront lot is zoned for commercial use; potential activities could be marine-related uses or a restaurant, he said.
The auction will take place via online bidding at tranzon.com.
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