Spooner Lambert

Spooner Lambert House
64 Bartlett Street, Roxbury
circa 1782

(1982-present)

	After negotiations with owner in 1983, HBI acquired a preservation restriction agreement on this 1782 house
	HBI purchased the property in July 1992 after it had been neglected due to a foreclosure in the fall of 1990
	HBI has rehabilitated the house into four moderate income apartments

(click images below for larger views)

1982

today

Buy real estate should be the last resort for a revolving fund, because the revolving concept becomes a study in slow motion. Yet if this is the only way an historic property can be saved, it is better to act than to lose an irreplaceable resource. When this 18th-century house, the third oldest structure in the Roxbury neighborhood, was on the verge of being transformed into a crack den and/or burned down if the one surviving nonpaying tenant left, Historic Boston purchased it from the receiver of the bank that had foreclosed on it. Rehabilitated at unduly high cost into four, moderate income apartments, the Spooner-Lamber House stands as a beacon of hope in a neighborhood of historic buildings the cumulative neglect of which is hard to understand.

While the income stream does not justify the necessary investment, the return comes close to what a money market fund would pay for the same investment, and in time Historic Boston should be able to sell the property to an owner-occupant.