East Bridgewater, MA Sullivan & Sullivan Auctioneers announced today that the firm will bring 31.8 acres of town land along Central St. to auction on behalf of the town. This public auction will consist of four separate offerings. The first is 31.8 acres industrial zone w/overlay 55+ district. The three other offerings contain two lots each with a total of 13,000 s/f.
“This is actually the third and final phase of a public auction involving a rare, prime development opportunity that had never been taken advantage of because of the land’s interesting and complex history dating back to the old Brockton Fair and the Hanson Land Company,” said Marianne Sullivan, whose firm has handled the phased municipal tax possession auction for the town.
According to town records and published reports, much of this land was held in the late 1800’s by a company called the Hanson Land Company, perhaps on behalf of the Brockton Fair, a local agricultural fair that got started around that same time. According to the recollections of the fair’s current owner, it seems tiny parcels of the land were either raffled off or given away as small farmer lots to fair attendees. Most of those winners never bothered to pay taxes on their small, unusable plots.
“Winning a piece of land may have been a fun thing to do at a fair, but it created quite a tax collection headache for generations of town collectors. It has taken a real team effort and the better part of two decades to go through all the legal procedures required to clear this land and bundle it for auction so we can finally get it back on the tax rolls. It will be wonderful to see this prime real estate begin to generate revenue for the town once again,” said East Bridgewater town assessor, Paula Wolfe.
Sullivan reports the in the first phase of the public auction, a large swath of land went to commercial use, the second phase saw land purchased and improved by residential development. This final phase has a zoning of industrial w/ overlay ARPUD 55+ district which Sullivan believes will make the land very attractive to senior living developers among others.
The Public Auction is scheduled to take place at 12:00PM on Thursday November 7, 2024 at East Bridgewater Town Hall. More information can be found at Sullivan-Auctioneers.com or by calling 617-350-7700.