home price in Rehoboth has jumped 64 percent.
Rehoboth real estate market attracts city folk
Kathleen McCarthy had reservations about moving from her Victorian
house off north Hope Street on Providence’s East Side to sleepy Rehoboth, Mass.,
seven years ago.
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It is, after all, a 20- to 25-minute drive out windy Route 44 – a journey
by Rhode Island standards. And McCarthy and her husband had grown accustomed
to the conveniences of living in Providence – the restaurants, movie theaters,
the library and their favorite grocery store, the former Bread & Circus,
now Whole Foods Market.
But at the time, their 5th-grade daughter had taken horseback riding lessons
in rural Rehoboth and grew fond of the horse farms that dot the town. And McCarthy,
a real estate agent, knew a good deal when she saw one.
“At the time (home prices) were very reasonable,” McCarthy said. They bought
a colonial – a 1972 home built to replicate the saltbox style of the late 1700s
– for just shy of $200,000. It’s now appraised at $370,000, she said.
Bucolic Rehoboth, with its ample lot sizes, good public schools and central
location for both Boston and Providence commuters, quietly has become a standout
in the hot southeastern Massachusetts housing market.
Just don’t expect to find the sort of deal that McCarthy got in 1997.
The median single-family home price has leapt 64 percent in two years, from
$175,000 in 2000 to $287,000 last year, according to the Warren Group, a real
estate research firm in Boston. That’s the biggest jump of any of the 20 communities
in Bristol County.
“It has taken off,” says McCarthy, a sales associate for Re/Max Heritage in
East Providence, which serves Rhode Island and southeastern Massachusetts. McCarthy
says it’s difficult to find a new three- or four-bedroom colonial under $500,000.
As for existing homes, $250,000 “ won’t buy much.”
The Multiple Listing Service (MLS) recently had 19 single-family homes listed
with an average list price of $424,889. Most are three- or four-bedroom colonials
or Capes, ranging from an 1840 farmhouse (the cheapest listing at $269,900)
to a brand-new, three-bedroom colonial in South Rehoboth ($489,900).
An influx of young families has pushed the town’s population from 8,600 in
1990 to around 12,000 now, according to town estimates.
Dighton-Rehoboth Regional High School ranked tops among Bristol County communities
for the percentage of seniors who passed both English and math components of
the highest Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS).
Rehoboth is 42 miles south of Boston, and many residents take the commuter
train from Attleboro, local real estate agents say. It’s only 10 miles from
Providence, and the town has been on the radar screen of professionals from
the Providence area for a long time.
“We’ve become a bedroom community of Boston; we’ve always been a bedroom community
of Providence,” said David Marciello, Rehoboth’s executive secretary.
Young families also are drawn to Rehoboth for its unusually generous lot sizes.
Zoning requires a minimum lot size of 60,000 square feet, or 1.4 acres, and
at least 200 feet of frontage.
Marciello said the town has taken steps to prevent high-density growth. “We
think the current zoning meets the rural character of the town,” he said.
In recent years, developers have created a number of new large-lot subdivisions
on former horse farms.
“It’s a beautiful town aesthetically with beautiful lots, and that’s what
a lot of people are looking for,” said Nick Helgesen, a broker at Re/Max Classics
in Rehoboth. “We’re seeing a lot of people from Providence who actually want
grass and trees and space.”
McCarthy, whose husband commutes to offices in Pawtucket and Boston, makes
her way into Providence several times a month, for doctors’ appointments, shopping
and dining at her favorite restaurants. She still does much of her grocery shopping
at the former Bread & Circus.
“It’s practically the closest grocery store,” McCarthy said.
Therein lies the downside – or at least what some might consider a downside
– to Rehoboth: threadbare services and amenities. There are no street lights.
No public water or sewer system. No trash collection.
The homes are on well and septic systems. Residents either contract with private
trash haulers or load their SUVs and minivans up with the week’s rubbish every
Saturday morning and haul it to the transfer station.
For those contemplating a move to Rehoboth, don’t anticipate those services
being added anytime soon.
“We will not in the future even think about town sewer or water service or
town trash collection,” Marciello said. “Not having those things limits massive,
close-proximity development.”
He said the town has been able to keep its property tax rate low in exchange
for the dearth of services. Rehoboth’s residential tax rate ranked 300th lowest
of the state’s 351 communities, according to a 2001 compilation by The Boston
Globe.
For her part, McCarthy says she can live with the trade-offs.
“We have this safe, wonderful, rural environment, and all those things we
loved about Providence are only 20 minutes away,” she said.
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