‘So much potential’
The Bells’ nautical bungalow in Ventnor has changed over the decades, but still brings Shore living in a small package.
Finding a quaint beach bungalow in Ventnor last November, a few blocks from the ocean and just steps away from the bay, was a dream come true for Amy and Zachary Bell.
As a child, Amy’s family spent summers visiting Ocean City, while Zachary’s family went to Sea Isle City. The Shore was their happy place.
“We started riding bikes on the boardwalk on Sundays and wondered if there was any way we could possibly afford a house down here,” recalled Zachary, a union electrician. “This house popped up.”
Not only was the price right, but the 1,200-square-foot single-family home had a spacious private yard and a driveway. The first floor includes the kitchen, living room, and bathroom. Two small bedrooms make up the second-floor loft.
“It’s not a standard cookie-cutter duplex,” said Amy, a special-education mathematics teacher at Egg Harbor Township High School and owner of AZ Cleaning & Maintenance in Ocean City. “It has that beachy feel from our childhood.”
The house needed some work, but the pair was up for the challenge. They updated the bathroom, replacing the toilet and vanity, and painted the home’s interior. They added lighting and fixed the floors upstairs. It seemed that the previous owners ran out of flooring, Amy thought.
“One half of the attic floor upstairs was updated with vinyl flooring, while the other half was the original subfloor,” she recalled. “I painted the subfloor white to freshen it up and make it look newer.”
Outside, they added an outdoor shower, expanded the yard into the driveway, and fenced in the yard. That’s where their dogs Connie, a 13-year-old teacup Yorkie, and Claire, a 2-year-old beagle, love to romp.
The couple prefers a minimalistic, uncluttered design style with a nautical theme, decorated in white and navy blue.
Above the kitchen table hangs a 1950s cargo ship light that Zachary turned into a hanging lamp. He found it at a site that salvages antique boat parts.
“I was looking for an antique light that I could rewire into a regular light,” he said. “Everybody buys the reproductions, but this has the original copper, aluminum, and glass cage around it. They just don’t sell that.”
Boat cleats serve as hooks for the outside shower and as decoration under the windows. Oars make up the posts where the outdoor lighting hangs. A “happy hour” bell hangs next to the kitchen.
A random knock on their door one day came with a welcome treat — the home’s original owners stopped by. The Bells were thrilled to invite them inside and learn about the home’s beginnings. When it was built, their house was the first on the street, with an unobstructed stretch of land to the bay.
Though Zillow lists the house as being built in 1935, the original owners came armed with the listing from when they bought it, which said it was built in 1942.
“There was a world war going on at the time,” noted Zachary, so it might have taken several years to complete the build.
Initially, the sole bedroom was downstairs and the house had no staircase — just a ladder to the attic. Subsequent owners knocked down walls to open the first floor living space and moved the primary and a guest bedroom into the attic, where clothes are stored on a hanging rack in lieu of a closet.
The Bells enjoy cooking and grilling and appreciate the ample cabinets and counterspace in their kitchen.
Next to the kitchen sits the living room, with an electric fireplace, exposed white ceiling beams, and a faux brick wall that leads to the staircase.
The loft ceilings are seven feet at their highest point but slope down to three feet. The tall couple — Zachary is 6-foot-4 and Amy is 5-foot-10 — have learned how to navigate the space.
“It took a little while to get used to but we’ve adapted,” said Amy. “You can’t really have coffee or breakfast in bed.”
The Bells spend a lot of time in their outdoor space, having coffee at the bistro table in the front of the house and cocktails and dinner out back.
For now, the couple live in Hammonton and rent out the cottage for much of the summer, keeping the shoulder seasons for themselves.
“The house has so much potential,” said Zachary. “You can see an unobstructed view of the bay from the upstairs window. If we put on a second-floor deck, we’d actually have a bay-view house.”
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