Only 257 residential properties built before 1927 remain across Seven Mile Island.
Stone Harbor has more century-old residential properties than Avalon, despite having roughly half as many homes.
An Ironside Shore Wire analysis of municipal tax records found 138 Stone Harbor residential properties built before 1927, compared with 119 in Avalon.
The difference is far greater as a share of each town’s housing stock.
Century-old properties account for 4.72% of Stone Harbor’s residential inventory, or nearly one in every 21 properties.
In Avalon, they account for 2.16%, or about one in 46.
The century-old buildings offer a window into an era when a summer cottage at the beach had a slightly different meaning.
Fortunately, it’s not hard to find the footpath to memory lane:
The Pebbles Beach House at 9400 First Avenue pushes past 100, as does the old Sassafras House at 8300 Second Avenue.
Distinctive non-residential century old buildings are easy to spot, too. The building associated with Springer’s Homemade Ice Cream was constructed in 1912. The Stone Harbor Yacht Club property carries a construction date of 1911.
The results align with work by the Stone Harbor Museum’s Vintage Houses program, which documents historic homes and their owners.
The tax data shows Stone Harbor has retained a larger concentration of century-old residential properties than its Seven Mile Island bunkmate — and neighboring Sea Isle City, where just 2.46% of the residential inventory has crossed the century mark.
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