Northshore Magazine

ne Real Estate Inventive Hosts Left to right, Peter Souhleris and Dave Seymour Flipping Phenomenon Dave Seymour and Peter Souhleris, co-hosts of A&E's Flipping Boston, take on a particularly challenging Newburyport property. By Alexandra Pecci A t this time last year, 37-39 Kent Street in Newburyport was a two-family home in need of a major revamp. Despite the 1820s-era building's beautiful, classic New England design 102 nshoremag.com March 2014 102_110_REV_NB KJ NS Mar14 flipping.indd 102 elements—exposed brick, original wood floorboards and beams, and antique fireplaces—the building was falling apart. The floor joists on the first floor had rotted, and the fireplaces were in disrepair. "If you went into one corner of the first floor and jumped, the whole floor bounced 6-8 inches," and some of the fireplaces, "were so far away from code it wasn't even funny," says Dave Seymour, co-owner of CityLight Homes and co-star of the A&E television show Flipping Boston. "The house was definitely in need of a lot of love." It certainly got love from CityLight Homes. Within a few months, the Peabody-based buying and selling firm bought, renovated, and "flipped" the two side-byside units on Kent Street, transforming the property into chic, livable spaces that retained much of their classic charm. Viewers can watch the start-to-finish transformation on an episode of Flipping Boston that's slated to air in the early spring. Flipping Boston is a fun, amusing peek inside the trials, tribulations, and triumphs of CityLight Homes' house flipping business. The episode featuring the Kent Street property injected a bit of friendly competition into the flip, too. The renovation process pitted CityLight Homes' co-owner Peter Souhleris against his wife, Desi, in a design contest. Each of them designed a unit to see which would be put under contract first. But before the husband-and-wife design duo could get their competition under way, Seymour and his crew of contractors had to work on making the building safe and habitable. For instance, they had to take out the whole first floor and reframe it, as well as clean and repair the brickwork. Seymour also had to remove some of the larger fireplaces; give the building a new roof and brandnew double-glazed windows; rewire the entire building; supply heat and air-conditioning to both units; and re-pour the concrete basements. Despite the need to extensively rebuild the property, the team wanted also to "maintain the historical integrity," says Seymour. "Keeping some of the original integrity of the building was a challenge," he says. "We were able to save some of the Newburyport [charm]." For instance, although the fireplaces photograph by joel laino 1/17/14 2:50 PM

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