He asked the Atlantic for five years.
asserted
He → ask → years
So far, the Atlantic has kept its end of the bargain.
asserted
Atlantic → keep → bargain
Massachusetts car dealer Charles Fotopoulos and his wife, Miglena, snapped up 93 Baxter Road, a 1951 cottage clinging to the edge of Nantucket’s storied Sconset Bluff, for $899,000 in September 2021.
asserted
Fotopoulos → snap → September
On an island where eight-figure price tags barely raise an eyebrow, it was one of the rare deals that year to come in under seven figures.
asserted
it → raise → figures
Just a few feet of ground now separate the back of the home from a 40-foot plunge to the sand.
asserted
feet → separate → sand
When it was built, the ocean sat hundreds of yards away.
asserted
ocean → build → yards
Over the decades, the retreating bluff has swallowed a string of the neighbors.
asserted
bluff → retreat → neighbors
The Fotopouloses, who run dealerships in Lowell and Westwood, went in with their eyes wide open.
asserted
who → run → eyes
“It was cheap and I said ‘hey, I’ll buy it’,” Charles told the Nantucket Current back when the deal closed.
asserted
deal → say → Current
“The foundation is structurally sound, and with the geotubes there, unless we have a killer storm, I think we’re safe.
asserted
we → have → storm
A lot of people think I’m crazy, but if I get five years out of it, I think I’m good.
asserted
I → think → it
I’ll take that any day.
asserted
I → take → that
“It’s both a great view, and a scary view,” he said.
asserted
he → ’ → ?
The sellers took a beating.
asserted
sellers → take → beating
Steven and Erin Freeman paid $1.53 million for the place in 2007, when a comfortable 50 to 70 feet of land still stood between the house and the drop.
asserted
feet → pay → house
They walked away roughly $631,000 poorer.
asserted
They → walk → ?
Their broker, Jamie Howarth, said nobody was fooled.
asserted
nobody → say → ?
“They knew the risks going in,” Howarth said in 2021.
asserted
Howarth → know → 2021
“I was clear with him and we were clear with him that there was serious risk.”
asserted
we → be → him
The Freemans didn’t surrender quietly.
asserted
Freemans → surrender → ?
In 2010 they hauled the house back toward Baxter Road, and in 2017 they took a DIY approach to shoring up the top of the bluff, work the island’s Conservation Commission never approved and slapped them with an enforcement order over.
asserted
Commission → haul → order
The couple were also active in the Sconset Beach Preservation Fund, the well-heeled homeowner group bankrolling the geotubes.
asserted
couple → heel → geotubes
Howarth figured the Freemans probably clawed back their loss and then some through summer rentals, with peak weeks fetching up to $10,000.
asserted
weeks → figure → 10,000
The new owners may have tried a similar play.
uncertain
owners → try → play
Listing records show the home was advertised as a rental in September 2025 at $10,000 a month, and this past summer, it rented for $29,500 per month.
Fotopoulos, for his part, insisted the numbers penciled out.
“It is what it is.
asserted
it → show → part
It’s a hole in the ocean on Nantucket.
asserted
It → ’ → Nantucket
It’s really worth $8 million if you really think about it.
asserted
you → ’ → it
The next comp down the street is $8.4 million,” he said at the time.
asserted
he → say → time
Today, similar comps on the island with oceanfront views have homes listed between $11.5 million to $29 million.
asserted
comps → have → million
His safety net was the geotubes, massive fabric sacks packed with sand and parked at the base of the bluff to absorb the surf.
asserted
net → pack → surf
They have slowed the erosion along that stretch.
asserted
They → slow → stretch
They have also become the most bitterly contested pile of sand on the island.
asserted
They → become → island
The Conservation Commission voted in 2021 to rip them out.
asserted
Commission → vote → them
The preservation group simply ignored that order.
asserted
group → ignore → order
After fresh collapses left big sections stripped bare, the commission’s chair warned in March that the project could be nearing “complete failure.”
uncertain
project → leave → failure
A winter storm packing gusts above 80 mph scoured away even more sand.
asserted
storm → pack → sand
The fight over expanding the wall has zigzagged ever since.
asserted
fight → expand → wall
Voters at the Town Meeting narrowly shot down the expansion this spring, a vote that blocks the 3,000-foot extension no matter what happens in court or at the state level.
asserted
what → shoot → level
A Superior Court judge nonetheless sided with the expansion permit in August, and the commission has signaled it may let the group patch a section damaged in what officials called suspected vandalism back in January.
uncertain
officials → side → January
Then state environmental regulators fired off an Aug. 31 letter flagging a dozen unresolved problems with the proposal, and the Select Board has so far refused to promise voters a second crack at it.
asserted
Board → fire → it
…and 8 more, not listed.
The Aporia
