mortgage payrnents. For some, fractional real estate;

worthwhile . !\4th fractional real estate, which is

with a club, your investment entitles you to betnelvr

weels of use annually in a resort-style setting. While

to pay to play, the overall cost could be lower than for

ond home. Pick which option best suits your lifestyle as

budget, and go from there.

For years I went through the mental calculations and

associated with coastal real estate. Several years ago, I,

Boston, and Block Island off the Rhode Island coast,

downtowns, good vibes. And despite the variety of location dqprice range, they all share one thing in conunon: great fuhing! ;

*--Lr ':'i'!ttt'!L I

Wwffi FTfr sy ffiawwm*fu asseffisTHE FISH FACTOR: Every town on Cape Cod has oceanfront

favorite spot in the world to fish. For a decade. I io

numerous properties there, and even found onel

couldn't afford it.

As the years passed, my income increased, and I

on other regions. I began vacationing on Cape Cod and

around at nurnerou.s properties. Ultimately, I found a place

my budget-a mile {iom some of my favorite striper flats.

So, dreams do come true, and dre variety of coastal properdt

near outstanding fishing is seemingly endless. Coastal real estate i

also a good long-term investrnent. fu the clich6 goes: "They ailr

making any more of it." In general, northern reaches hold theirl

value a bit more than do southern areas- which are more

dramatic storms and hurricanes. I had a fiend whose familv owned

20 acres of land on Nantucket that drev used firr deer

[4ren the whitetail numbers dropped in the I960s, they sold

parcel for $30,000. Today, that property is worth about $I5 n

lion. In short, most coastal properties appreciate in value. r

Nonetheless, ask a bunch offishermen where they'd buy a

and you'll get a bunch of different answers. That said, here is a

pler of coastal towns and approximate costs ofpurchasing your

piece of terra fuma. These locales have it all: pristine

erty, the question is: Where do you want to livel The torvn cf

Der-nis is an excellent starting point, for it spreads the

width of the Cape, liom oceanside to bay side . If you choose

bay, you're smack in between Barnstable Harbor

Brewster Flats for striped bass and bluefish, and a short

bluefin tuna. If you chose the ocean side, you're in the midc

bass, bluefish, bonito, Spanish mackerel, and false

World-famous Monomoy is a quick run, and depending on

boat you can hit Martha's Vineyard in an hour. I

MARKET TRENDS: Waterfront prices range from a low offor an 800-square-foot, two-bed, two-bath condo, to $4.for an oceanfront estate. A four-bed, two-bathroom rai

with 1,950 square feet and a living room, family room, kitellaundry room on .37 acres with a dock is $799,999.

"t':t":. ,';

Per Square Fooc $410Bst. Mortgage: $4,045MLS Number: 70468110

54 I Saltwater Fly Fishing I www.flyfishingmagazines.com

n Gity, New JerceyTHE FISH FACTOR: The Garden Stare offers seasonal fishing thatfills a full year. In the spring you'll find bass, blues, and weak-fish in the bays, inlets, creeks, and rivers. If you don't want tofish Ocean City's beaches, Grear Egg Harbor Inlet offersinshore islands such as the Rainbow Islands and Drag Island,bays such as Great Egg Harbor and Peck Bay, and Patcong,

]ob, or Flat Creeks and the Tuckahoe River. Come summer,you can fish for tuna and dolphin offshore as well as albies,bonito, and skipjacks. The bass and blues return in the falland winter.

d City, North GarclinaTHE FISH FACT0R: The Outer Banla are an angler's dream, with a mlxofnorthern and southern species, such as striped bass and bluefish, aswell as albies, bonito, drum) sea trout, cobia, and others. Situated onBogue Sound, Morehead City is around rhe corner from BackSound. Core Sound. and the famous Harker's Island.MARKET TRENDS: Heading south of the Mason-Dixon Line, buy-ers get more value for their money. And Morehead City is noexception. Values run from a low of $249,000 for a property on

MARKET TRENDS: In real-estate terms, the ]ersey Shore has seenexponential growth from New Yorkers who can't touch West-chester's or Long Island's price points but still want proximiry toManhattan. But it ain't cheap: waterfront prices start at $1.2 mil-lion and go up to $5.3 million. A 2,000-square-foot home withfour beds, three baths, nine total rooms, and a half acre of landwith a waterfront dock will run about $2.2 million.

Per Square Foot: $1,100Est. Mortgage: $ll,l19MLS Number:278597

Crab Point Bay to a high of $2.2 million. For a median, pi*ureyourself in a 1929 three-story home with four bedrooms, 3Zbaths, and I0 total rooms fiIEng 4,176 square feet on I.26 acresof land. You'll have a dock in your front yard, and a two-cargarage for your gear-all for $995,000.

Per Square Foot: $238Est. Mortgage: $5,031MLS Number:064798

AugusVSeptember 2007 I 55

Per Square Foot: $305Est. Mortgage: $4,020rMLS Number: 23II0I

morada, FloridaTHE FISH FACTOR: If you like fly fishing fbr tzupon, permit, ancl

bonefish, chances are strong that yon'r,e alread\r been to

Islamorada. Known as the Sportfishing Capital of the Worid,

Islamorada's got the inshore slam on thc numcrous flats sur-

rounding your home. The backcountry is ir short boat ride awa,v,

and you can find snook, reds, and seasonal laid-up tarpon and

cobia in the mangroves of Flamrngo and Hell's Bays. If you har,e

to pass on the flats and backcountry fishing, all is not lost.

Islamorada has some excellent night fishing for tarpon around

the bridges and snook under the dock lights.

MARKET TRENDS: It's slim pickings down here, not for world-class

fishing, but for homes. Property values have grown steadily since

1998, with a peak in fall 2006. Sales trends for 2007 are show-

ing single-digrt declines and may make for a good time to buy.

You'll find more properties in the surrounding areas, and a quick

perusal of local properties turns up this gem: a 2,800-square-foot

home with five beds, four baths, and a new dock and boat ramp

on the premises for $1,890,00.Per Square Foot: $675Est. Mortgage: S9,557

MLS Numberz 539076

AugusVSeptember 2007 | 57

mrahchicola, FloridaTHE FISH FACT0R: Apalachicola-including its tributaries: the

Chipola, the Brothers and the Litde St. Marks-and its four-bay sys-

tem has been a hub for tarpon, reds, snook, trout, and cobia for

years. \Alhat makes the area so good is the muddy flow from the

Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers out of Georgia to the Woodruff

Dam to form the Apalachicola River. The outflow is rich in nutrients

and creates a fertile environment for oysters and-more important-

outstanding fishing in the bay, rivers, and salt marshes. You'll find

reds and trophy trout in Indian I-agoon, and Cape San Blas is one of

dre best spots for a fall-run of bull reds. St. Vincent Island has great

beach fishing. Offshore fishing for king mackerel is tluee miles away.

MARKET TRENDS: Appalachicola has escaped most of the

Panhandle real estate madness of the last decade, but as

Florida's largest private landowner, St. Joe Paper, continues to

convert timber holdings to real estate development, the area is

facing another potential growth cycle . There isn't a whole lot

for sale in town in Appalachicola, but if you want a place over-

looking some water) look no further than the Brothers River. A

3,000-square-foot six-bed, four-bath home with two acres of

land and a boat house, ramp, and dock with a swimming pool

built in 1972 wlll run you $1,895,000.Per Square Fooc $631Est. Mortgage: 59,582

MLS Number: 110208

lfport, MississippiTHE FISH FACTOR: Gulfoort is redfish and speck heaven, with

shark, amberjack, dolphin, several species of tuna, cobia, and sea-

sonal billfish offshore. Due south of Gulfport is the Chandeleur

Islands, a crescent-shaped sring of about a dozen islands that are

litde more than sandbars. The cuts and flats offer some of the

best redfish fishing around, with many bulls in the 30- to 50-

pound range. Biloxi Marsh sports hundreds of miles of flats and

river systems, too. l{urricane Katrina devastated the area, but dre

fishing is on the mend. New cuts and channels allow fish to get

to places that they never could access before.

MARKET TRENDS: Hurricane damaee over the vears drives the

58 I Saltwater Fly Fishing I wivw.flyfishingmagazines.com

price of real estate down, making Gulfport one of the value

markets in our listing. The Mississippi-l,ouisiana coast is

rebuilding, and there are good deals to be found. Many insur-

ance companies are thinking twice about offering hazard, flood,

and wind coverage, so make srrre you will qualify before you

buy. That said, a three-bed, two-badr, 2,450-square-foot home

located on Bernard Bayou with a garage and dock in front of

your half acre of land costs $239,000.Per Square Foot: $97Est. Mortgage: $1,209MLS Number 179474

I r . : : r ' r t i#=i :.=.,j,li.lilt,]1.,lrl:._r::. : , t t r t i

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II

San Diego' GaliforniaTHE FISH FACT0R: Fishing around San Diego can be dicey; Nary

SEAI-S train along the beaches, and hooking one ain't a good idea.

But the kelp beds of La Jolla and Point I-oma offer great structure

for calico and white sea bass. You'll find bonita and sponed bay

bass in San Diego, Mission, and Oceanside Bays and corbina and

corvina on the beaches. Occasional bonefish are also caught on

the beaches off Coronado. Offshore, San Diego is well known for

long-range fishing trips for yellowfn, yel-

lowtail, bluefin, wahoo, and dorado.MARKET TRENDS: While San Diegoproperty values have appreciated

steadilypercent

Apin 2slighdygood y

home ir

southw,square I

steadily over thepercent increase

April 2006. Inslighdy but stea<good you'll find

home in the Sar

southwest of thtsquare feet and i

Per Square.Est. Mortga

but r

ou'lIn the

est o:feet a

Squ,, Mor

S N t

ne past

r. Withone yol

Diego r

ciw. A

e crty exposts betvand a ha

,000 horEntry pr)mes on 1

ed, three

backyard

rde, the ciqerty costsyear and

over 8,00Cr like . Entr

tfea comes

four-bed, tyour back8008rt23005

: decade, dpropertypast year

Mith overe you likeego afea c

y. A four-1rck in yotu,c $580$10,08107r0230c

l one your Diego are city. A fca dock in 1Fooc $58rge: $10,01rcr:07102

ic 126)3 and:Iining,ces are)-water

lnado,

3,437000.

ed a dramatic 12(anuary 2003 anc

ces are decliningr sale, chances arrr an on-the-waterand of Coronadohome with 3,43ifor $I.995.000.

r-the-w

Coron;widr 3,,995,00r

edac l ranuary

ces arer sale, r

r a n o rrnd ofhome'

[or $I, '

n Januprices

for safor arisland

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:y price for eon the islan,

hree-bath hcyard goes for

60 t Saltwater Fly Fishing I www.flyfishingmagazines.com

ffiwffimmw#. ffimfumffiB&ffiffiTHE FISH FACT0R: Considered the Bonefish Capital of the World,

the 2,300-square -mile Andros Island offers a lot more than just

bones. Most anglers come for the Ghost of the Flats, but there

are also seasonal tarpon and permit, barracudas, Blue Hole div-

ing, and weekend Rake and Scrapes. Much of the angling takes

place in Central Andros around C*SI Creek, but drerc is plenty

of action to the north, from Stafford and Fresh Creek all the way

up to the ]oulters. South Andros offers about 40 miles of flats

that run from Mangrove Cay to Curly Cut Cay. You'll find a wide

range of fish, liom large schools of single-digit bones to double-

digit trophy fish. The variety of unexplored areas makes Andros

Island a fly fisherman's paradise .

MARKET TRENDS: Once a thriving cash center, in the mid-S0s

Reagan's Zero Tolerance act put a hurt on island "commerce"and property values tanked. There has been a resurgence in

recent times, with undeveloped land being the main cornmodity.

There are sorne homes fbr sale, and a tiree-bed, three-batl.roorn

honse 90 feet from your own flat on I / 4 acre of land near Cargill

Creek will cost you $385,000. The 1,500-square-fbot home also

has an attic that could be converted to another bedroom.

Per Square Fooc $256Est. Mortgagez $1,927MLS Number:5494J

Toru l(eer is a licensed. reabor antl regulnr contt'ibwtor to Saltwater

Fly Fishing. He liyes'in Welftleet, Massachusetts.

AugusVSeptember 2007 ffi 61

S t e y e Wnlburn

ONE STEP CLOSERIOR ABOUT THE IAST FIFTEEN YEARS OR SO. I'\IE TENDED THEembers of two pipe dreams that, happily, never seem to go out. One is to own ahouse in the mountains. and the other is to own a house by the sea. But here it

is more than a decade and a half into the pipe, and here I am stalled at part one of themaster life plan. Back in 1989, my wife and I were lucky enough (and at the time brokeenough) to qualify for a Board of Housing loan and buy our starter home in the originalLast Best Place-just before all of creation discovered that Montana actually means

"mountain." We lived in the house barely two years before career opportunities lured ustoward more crowded horizons in the urban South, beginning a slow but inevitableemotional detachment from the litde yellow house at the corner of Mill and 2nd Street,25 miles from Glacier National Park, eight miles from Chairlift One. We were srr-rounded by thousands of square miles of snowy wilderness, rivers made for cutthroattrout and the fly rod, and forests deep with spruce) tamarack, and grouse. Grizzhesroamed the eastern tree line.

So then we moved. And what started out as a two-year retreat from the idyllic turned into16 years ofwork, rent) car payments, dance lessons, college tuition, and second-home own-ership far away from the Great Northern. Nonetheless, having bought a sliver of Montana atprobably the last moment in history that we could have afforded it, we stubbornly hung ontothe property, right from the start exceeding our mortgage pa).rrlent with monthly rentalincome. We've never spent another night in that house, but it's still there, more than payngfor itse[ thus frrlfilling one halfof the Walburn prophecy. It's that saltier second halfthat hasproved harder to reali.z,e, for if, as the old saying goes about coastal real estate, "They ain'tmaking any more of it," then they apparendy have not made mine yet at all.

Search as we might, the opportunity to buy into the American coast has not yetcaught up with the ever accelerating rate of exclusion. \44ren we first began looking atbeach property in the Florida panhandle more than a decade ago, you could get a hun-dred feet of sand on the shore break for $225 thousand. We wondered what Midaswould pay that. Today, the same lot might fetch a couple of million or more. So, find-ing ourselves on the outside of an ever-expanding bubble in Florida real estate, we beganlooking-well, daydreaming really-about blue elsewheres. The Outer Banks, perhaps)The Bahamasf Maybe Charleston, or the Golden Isles of my own native Georgia.

It's a dream that many of you no doubt share: to walk out your screen door in themorning braced by a sea breeze, fly rod in one hand, boat key in the other. To own apiece of the salt before every inch of our coast becomes a fiefdom of the rich and famous.In this issue, fellow daydreamer, ,lEFcontributor, and licensed realtor Tom Keer pensour fust annual overview of coastal real estate from a fly rodder's perspective f"FishShacks," page 52), sharing a bit of personal experience with his own coastal pursuits.We've limited the coverage to towns that are first and foremost "fishy as hell" and, sec-ondly, that present a range of geographic and financial possibilities. We think you'll findsomething to interest every reader, no matter your location or tastes. And we will makeit an annual feature.

For me, coastal investment is still a few years away. But it recendy got a litde closerwhen I accepted a new position with our company that requires moving from Adanta toAugusta. It's a litde farther from the mountains, but indeed twice as close to the sea. I'llstill be editing my favorite magazine (and hopefirlly it's one of yours), albeit with anexpanded role in the entire Morris Communications family of great sporting tides. Restassured, however, that the compass direction of mymove was no coincidence. It's allpart of the plan, and hopefirlly one step closer to the dream. I

4I Saltwater Fly Fishing I www.flyfishingmagzines.com

P U S L l S H E B

William S. Morris III

G E N E N A L M A N A G E R / E D I T O R

Steve Walburn

A R I D I R E C T A B

Wayne Knight

E D I T O R I A L D I R E C T O RPhihp Monahm

6 R O U P E D I I A E

David I(ausmeyer

M A N A G ] N G E D I T O R

Russ Lumpkn6 B A P H I C D E S I G N E R

lemifer Keller VazF U L F I L L M E N f M A N A G E R

Jennifer DmigmS l i S l , V F S S M A N A G E R

Michelle L. Rou,c

A D V E N T I S I N G B T P F E S E N T A T 1 V E SAtbertidng Direcror Michael Floyd

(706) 823-3739 Fax: (706) 724-3873gsj fl oyd@eartlrlirk.net

Northeast ScottBuchmalrf978) 462-0335 Fax: (478) 462-o445

sbuchmayr@u'orldret.att.net

Mithtest,/Soutbeox AmosCrowlev(888) 299"5255 Fu: (.140) 564-5244

amos@buchmayrcrowley.com

Western Clay Muray(,817) 626-7787 Fax: (817) 626-7786

clay@spurmcrcmtilecon

Expeditions ChadMcClue(706) 828-3832 Fax: (706) 724-3873

chad.mcclure@morns.com

Art nnd. Expeditiolr Vicki Hcndrix(304) 291-0137 Fu: (304) 292-0766

vicki.hendrix@adelphia.net

Atbertising Coordlrarar MillicentWilliams(.706) 823-3629 Fax: (706) 724-3873

milliccn t.williurs@morris.com

C O N T B I B U I I N G W R I f E R SHenry Corvcn, J. M. Chico Fernandez,

lerry Gibbs, Eci Jalrorowski, Johr A. Kumiski,Dr. David A. Ross, Jack Sanson, Phil Shook, Bob Stemns

SIIBSCRIPIION INQIJIRIES:(Orders, acldres chmgcs, problems)

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;HA:RMAN ANl cEl Williun S. Morris IIIpnrsrorrr Will S. Morris IV

DnEcrlR oF NATtINAL uro,azrres Carl W. Mullins

sTRATE;tc ADVisoR David C. Foster

lp:nAnavs DtREctlR Curtis B. Matthews

c0NSUutB MARKETtN6 otnrcran Chetyl O'Connell

covTBoLLEB Scott Ferguson

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02007 MCC Magazines, LLCIAll rights rcscrvccl. Volumc 13, Issuc 4.

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