Housing
This section of the BDN aims to help readers understand Maine’s housing crisis, the volatile real estate market and the public policy behind them. Read more Housing coverage here.
Just outside Augusta, a 1,900-square-foot home up for sale still holds evidence of its former life as a one-room schoolhouse.
The 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom home in Manchester has been fully remodeled, but the original flooring from the schoolhouse remains intact. The floor still has holes from where the desks were attached and scuff marks show where the students sat, Pat Ladd of Homestead Realty, the listing agent for the property, said.
Smaller footprints rubbed into the floor show where the younger students sat while longer tracks signal where the older students were placed, Martha LaMarche, who owns the property with her husband, said.
“The floors, to me, are just magical,” LaMarche said. “The history etched into those floors is amazing.”
The former schoolhouse hit the market earlier this month with an asking price of nearly $420,000. That’s a bit higher than the value of an average home in Manchester, which Zillow placed at roughly $387,000 as of last month.
Built in 1861, the property served as a one-room schoolhouse for nearly a century before it was decommissioned in the 1950s, Ladd said. While the building hasn’t held students for more than 70 years, chalkboards still line the walls of the main living space, and the walls of the bathroom show where students carved their names.
“You can feel the history when you walk in,” Ladd said. “It speaks from the house.”
The sellers, who primarily live in Portland, bought it in 2016 and slowly renovated it to serve as their camp, LaMarche said. A second floor was added to the home, which holds the master bedroom and bathroom.
During renovations, LaMarche said she found nearly two dozen sheets of schoolwork, a book and even a toy pistol stuffed under paneling along the walls.
The property is fully insulated, making it livable all year. The sellers also updated the septic system, plumbing infrastructure and wiring, among other cosmetic improvements, Ladd said.
LaMarche also had the new electrical wiring placed underground, to preserve the historic appearance of the former schoolhouse, she said.
The property on Collins Road offers roughly a half-acre filled with gardens and is just down the road from Cobbosseecontee Lake. It’s also surrounded on three sides by more than 800 acres of conservation land with walking trails and a pond, Ladd said.
“You have all this access to the outdoors without paying for it,” Ladd said. “It’s perfect for somebody who loves nature and wants to be able to walk in the woods and take in the tranquility of the surrounding area.”
Previous owners also added an additional bedroom and smaller space, which could serve as a studio, to the back of the house. LaMarche said that could be replaced with a larger addition to serve a bigger family.
The owners decided to sell it after their children and grandchildren moved to southern Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont.
“It’s very hard to leave it, but I hope someone falls in love with it the way I did,” LaMarche said. “I hope whoever comes in next preserves the dignity of the space.”
