OCEAN CITY — The fantastic single-family home at 701 Ocean Ave. in the Ocean City Historic District is the perfect blend of old and new.
“This expansive home is located on a corner lot and is close to all of the best attractions,” listing agent Mark Grimes said.
While the exterior has been upgraded with new materials such as composite decking, vinyl railings and siding — all things that suffer at the salty seashore — and the most important parts of the interior — kitchen, plumbing — enough elements of this home’s grand past remain to arouse nostalgia for the simpler times.
Located on the corner of Seventh Street just a couple of blocks from the beach, the four-story home has eight total bedrooms, eight bathrooms, including the ground-floor guest suite with one of each.
A staircase rises to the first floor from both sides facing the street. The main one is along Ocean Avenue and ascends to the covered, wrap-around porch where there’s abundant room for a holiday get-together, no matter the season or reason.
The second set of stairs rises to a small porch with entry into the rear of the home. Beyond the stairs is the enclosed outside shower and one-car garage, but with plenty of street parking, it may be used more for stowing beach gear and surfboards than vehicles.
Stone pillars and walls make up the ground floor, where there is access to the guest suite and space for storing bikes out of the weather.
Up on the porch, where there is a large wall-mounted television and surround sound speakers, the original wood door with leaded-glass window and brass hardware opens into a foyer, where it is immediately evident that this home means business.
“As you enter into the foyer, you immediately see the charming details including beautiful hardwood floors, stained glass windows and a grand staircase rising along the right wall,” Grimes said.
This main level features an open living room, dining room and kitchen, mudroom with access to a side porch and a powder bathroom.
Opening off the hall to the left is the living room. It’s likely that some work has been done to open this space up — it has a wide doorway off the hall and there is no barrier between it and the dining area to the rear — but the result was clearly worth the effort. The space is light and bright due to multiple tall windows, some with original beveled glass, and the traffic flow is unimpeded by walls and narrow doors.
The dining area features a curved bay of windows overlooking Seventh Street, where a long table that seats eight awaits a family hungry from their hours spent on the beach and boardwalk.
A peninsula with three stools for overflow seating partially separate the dining area from the kitchen, which has Brookhaven cabinets with stone tops and stainless-steel appliances. The brick flooring does a terrific job of bringing the past back into the aesthetic.
Off the kitchen is the mud room with 48-inch bead board wainscoting and access to the sun deck above the garage and the smaller porch.
Heading back toward the foyer, there is a powder room in the corner off the kitchen and a door opening onto the basement stairs. Below, there is a laundry room with a full-size washer and dryer and two other storage rooms, one with a door to the outside.
The top two floors encompass the bedrooms and bathrooms, the primary bedroom with en suite bathroom and sitting area.
Three bedrooms are on the first of these two floors, including the primary suite stretching from front to rear along the Seventh Street side. It has a queen-size bed, sofa facing a wall-mounted television the three closets. The ensuite bathroom has a faux brick floor, dual-sink vanity and fiberglass shower.
Each of the other two bedrooms has a queen-size bed and split bathroom, featuring a toilet and shower with a vanity in the bedroom.
The top floor contains four more bedrooms with the same bathrooms setup.
“This is a lovely home with easy access to the beach, boardwalk and downtown shopping and restaurants,” Grimes said.
Ocean City is one of the most popular shore resorts on the East Coast, featuring a 2.5-mile-long oceanfront boardwalk filled with hundreds of shopping, dining and entertainment venues, as well as miles and miles of pristine beaches. There also is an award-winning downtown business district centered on Asbury Avenue and a watersports district around Third Street on Bay Avenue.
A great location doesn’t only mean beachfront or bayfront on this 8-mile-long island — there are 10 distinct neighborhoods, each with its own characteristics.
The beach and boardwalk — 2.5 miles of oceanfront entertainment, restaurants, thrill rides and souvenir shops — get most of the attention in this seaside resort, but the island has much more to offer.
An award-winning downtown stretches from Sixth to 14th streets along Bay Avenue and has expanded onto other nearby streets, offering more than 100 shops and cafes. There’s also the popular watersports district around Third Street on Bay Avenue, where the brave can rent powerboats, go parasailing, join the crew of a pirate ship and take a kayak tour of the back bays. Private and party boat fishing tours are also available.
– By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff
