By Amanda Estes

Staff Writer

Construction is underway at 515 Ocean House Road in Cape Elizabeth,
making way for a new two-story residential and office condominium
building.

Located beside Rudy’s of the Cape diner, the Kettle Cove Condominiums
will offer roughly 4,300-square-feet of office space on the first floor
and four, 1,000 square foot two-bedroom units on the second floor.

The project received planning board approval in 2005, when local
developer Joel Fitzpatrick, who is currently seeking approval for a
residential condominium development on Eastman Road, presented the
development as the Two Lights Professional Center.

According to planning board minutes from June 2005, abutter Gail
Schmader said the project would have a significant impact on her
property. She wanted to verify the height of a stockade fence around
the property’s solid waste container and asked that an existing tree be
saved as a buffer.

Fitzpatrick agreed to add street trees along Davis Point Lane, which
will connect to the development, and said he would replace the existing
tree should it die during excavation, according to the notes.
Conditions of approval also included sewer easements to allow for
future extensions and pedestrian easements to provide future access to
Great Pond.

Developer Andrew Ingalls, who owns Ingalls Commercial Brokerage in
South Portland, said the building’s first floor will be service retail
oriented.

Ingalls is also behind a four-story office condominium at 100 Waterman
Drive in South Portland’s Knightville neighborhood. He doesn’t have any
buyers yet, but Ingalls said, “We don’t need to sell it to build it
which is a big advantage in terms of marketing because when people see
it there much more likely to be interested in it than if they see it on
paper.”

“We’ve got six months to build it,” he added. Ingalls has said he is
targeting service retail businesses and possibly a restaurant for the
31,668-square-foot building.

Ingalls said he had already heard from an architect who is interested
in an office at the Cape Elizabeth location and he envisions it to be
an ideal spot for accountants, dentists and similar businesses.

“There’s an awful lot of very talented people who work out of their
homes in Cape Elizabeth,” Ingalls said. “It would be great for them to
get out of the house, but they don’t want to spend too much to do it
and they don’t want to leave Cape Elizabeth.”     

The first floor, which can be subdivided into two 2,150-square-foot
units will cost interested buyers $175 per square foot while the
residential units cost roughly $235,000.

Fitzpatrick said they are not gearing the units toward a specific
market, but he said they would be probably be more attractive to
professional couples or single parents.

Ingalls said the building will be a good neighbor because it will be
high quality with a shingle style exterior and lots of glass, letting
in natural light.

Town Planner Maureen O’Meara said she has heard the building’s residential component seems to be very popular with the public.

“We have been for some time now promoting a concept of a mixed use
building,” she said. “We had two buildings actually approved using that
concept in the town center, but neither or those were actually built.”

Fitzpatrick said crews are currently laying down the foundation and he expects the building to be finished this spring.