Wealthy beach lovers remain devastated as they are forced to cut the prices of their luxury seaside homes by millions due to climate change.
Climate experts believe that sea level rise and brutal storms, heavy rainfall, coastal flooding and erosion are the culprits putting homeowners in a precarious position – and the unpredictability of it all.
The areas with some of the most expensive real estate that have been hardest hit include Dana Point, California, Long Island, New York and Nantucket, Massachusetts. CNBC reported.
In September, a beachfront home on Nantucket that was on the market for $2.3 million dropped to as much as $600,000 after their shoreline lost 75 feet to erosion. The owner, Lynn Tidgewell, said: ‘This rate of erosion was not typical’ and ‘reduced the price significantly knowing that every potential buyer was taking a risk.’
IN PHOTO: A house on Pocomo Beach on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. Several preventative methods are used to keep the seawall intact near expensive homes
A for sale sign is placed on a beachfront property where a house used to stand before it was washed away by Hurricane Sandy in October 2013
Storm-induced erosion in Pismo Beach, California, is worrying oceanfront homeowners
Tidgewell said she bought the Nantucket property on Sheep Pond Road in 2021 for $1.65 million, city records show.
At the time, the house stood more than 100 feet from the top of a coastal bank, and a geological survey estimated that at the current rate of erosion the house would last at least twenty, if not longer.
She said she’took the chance because of the magnificent beauty of the location, but after two years I noticed that the land near her house began to disappear, taking up about 15 feet of her backyard.
In the few years she lived there, she said her home was hit by other storms, including Hurricane Lee took in another 20 feet in September, and as much as 75 feet were swallowed up between then and December, the news channel reported.
Brendan Maddigan, who bought the property in February, benefited from the price drop but knew the risks.
He told The Boston Sphere: ‘I like to think it will be around for a while, but I was definitely aware of the risk of a particular storm causing problems in the future.’
This year’s hurricane season has begun and forecasters are predicting “above normal” activity.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is predicting up to thirteen hurricanes, four to seven of which are categorized as “major” storms for this year’s hurricane season.
Waves crash into boulders in front of homes on Capistrano Beach in Dana Point, one of the most expensive real estate areas, and areas are hardest hit
Leah Hill, Nantucket’s climate resilience coordinator, said some property lines on the island are now completely underwater.
She told the news station that nearly 2,400 buildings are at risk from coastal flooding and erosion, with annual damage estimated at $3.4 billion, if the city fails to reduce coastal risks between now and 2070.
A Nantucket-developed coastal resilience plan, which helps inform homeowners about ways to protect their property, was created based on the findings Hill pointed out.
According to the plan, sea levels on Nantucket rose eight inches between 1965 and 2019.
Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard experience the highest beach erosion rates statewide, according to the Trustees of Reservations State of the Coast 2021 report, which found parts of Nantucket’s south coast have retreated as much as 1,800 feet since the 1800s.
The city of Pacifica, just south of San Francisco, is ground zero on the issue of coastal erosion. On January 20 and 21, the combination of an ocean tide and a king tide caused high waves. Some houses and apartment buildings have already been lost to the forces of nature
Construction equipment prepares to demolish a house that fell off its foundation after yesterday’s winter storm eroded the shoreline on Plum Island.
In Montauk, on the eastern side of Long Island, the area and its multimillion-dollar homes were battered more than ever by a series of storms.
“Where we’ve seen flooding in the past and the water immediately receded, it’s not receding anymore,” said Kay Tyler, executive director of Concerned Citizens of Montauk.
“We have a friend who has a ten million dollar house, and he doesn’t even know what to do with it because if he sells it, it will never be the ten million dollars he bought it for.”
Some homeowners on Nantucket are seeking property tax relief as their property values decline due to things beyond their control.
Some consult a lawyer to have their home reappraised.
“I think we just buried our heads in the sand,” said attorney Chris Farley. “Values have only come down in the last decade and it’s still kind of a silent reduction.”
Farley pointed to one property, which he said had an appraisal of $2.2 million.
Although he noted it has not been assessed recently, two other homes on the same street and on the coastal bluff have been reassessed – one at $500,000 and one at $250,000. The cliff is seriously eroding.