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Historic Middleburg Plantation up for bid
By Kathleen Dayton
Staff Writer
If the median price of a Lowcountry home is $211,000, what is the price of Middleburg Plantation, a late 17th-century home surrounded by 326 pristine acres along the Cooper River?
For now, it’s priceless.
John McAllister, a Columbia-based real estate consultant who is marketing the property, said the owners of Middleburg are accepting sealed bids to be opened at 11 a.m. Oct. 30. They can either accept a bid at that time, or they can opt to hold a live auction on the property one week later.
“We don’t know its true value,” McAllister said. “That’s why we’re doing a sealed bid, convertible auction. There are several ways to assess value of a property and one is the comparable price method and there are not any comparables for a 1697 plantation house.”
The Berkeley County tax assessor’s office currently values the property at more than $1.1 million.
McAllister said Middleburg is the oldest house south of Virginia and one of the few homes from its time that escaped burning during both the Revolutionary and Civil wars.
The property includes the ruins of a steam rice mill that had made it a center of commerce until the 1920s. The next buyer will also get a few unique amenities: a slave cemetery, the remains of a wine storage room in what is now an upstairs bathroom, and original glass window panes etched with names and dates from the past.
The estate is being sold by Max and Jane Hill, who purchased it in 1981. The home, located off Cainhoy Road in Huger, has been kept in a limited family partnership and has been used as a weekend getaway. The Hills have ensured the home was authentically restored, working with experts who at times used antique tools to craft repairs. The Hills also have placed easements on the property to protect it from encroaching development.
Max Hill, a former local real estate broker who is now 80, said he hopes an individual or group will buy it, care for it and carry the restoration forward.
“It’s like placing your baby up for adoption,” Hill said.
The plantation grounds are an outdoorsman’s paradise, with riverfront, ponds, dense forest and a field that is still being cultivated.
“There are turkeys, deer, bobcats and all snakes known to man,” Hill said. “That’s not a selling point.”
The house was built in 1697 by Benjamin Simons, a French Huguenot immigrant, and in 1799 came into the Lucas family when Simons’ great-granddaughter, Sarah Lydia Simons, married Jonathan Lucas Jr. Lucas, an entrepreneur and inventor, is credited with a number of improvements to the plantation, including a Flemish stable and commissary, a guitar-shaped garden, an avenue of oaks and ornamental ponds.
“He was the Bill Gates of his day,” McAllister said. “He was one of, if not the, richest men in the world. He had properties not only in South Carolina, but in Egypt and Great Britain.”
Middleburg was the site of multiple parties for movers and shakers throughout the 18th and 19th century. Guests included President James Monroe in 1819 and the Marquis de LaFayette in 1825. The plantation is listed as a National Historic Landmark by the National Trust For Historic Preservation.
When Middleburg changes hands, it will be only the third time the property has been sold in its more than 300-year history. McAllister said the property is getting interest from all over the world. The J.L. Todd Auction Co. of Rome, Ga., is handling the bidding process.
Bob Hortman, a sales associate with William Means Real Estate who specializes in marketing and selling country estates, said it is very difficult to put a value on historic structures.
“A person has to have a love of the property to pay for that historic value,” Hortman said. “Usually when we’re looking at property and trying to figure out value…the location is very important in determining the value of the dirt. Then you put assets on top of it, such as timber value, and then you add structures or improvements, such as houses, barns, wells and other capital improvements that were put into the property to make it what it is today.”
Negatives also figure into the purchase price, he said, and conservation easements are sometimes considered negatives because they prevent land from being developed.
“In some places around the Charleston area, you’re probably looking at a 50 percent to 55 percent deduction in value,” he said. “If there is an easement that doesn’t allow for subdivision, you start deducting for that. The only unknown is the historical value.”
Middleburg is also not what many buyers have in mind when they picture a Southern plantation home, Hortman said. The Middleburg house is a fairly simple farmhouse, as is the home at Medway Plantation, which was built in the Dutch style. Neither home sports the large Greek Revival-style columns which remind people of Tara, the plantation in the 1939 film “Gone With The Wind.”
“People from New York looking for historic properties, they’re looking for Tara,” McAllister said. “It will be interesting to see how this works out.”
Kathleen Dayton is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail her at kdayton@setcommedia.com.
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