Serendipity, the iconic cottage on northern Hatteras Island that has become both famous and infamous in recent years, is on notice from Dare County that the owners must move it or remove it.

Dare County’s planning director Ray Sturza is in the process of declaring the property a public nuisance.

“The owners will have 10 days,” Sturza said, “to abate the nuisance or make an appeal.”

He said their choices to abate the nuisance are to move the house or to tear it down.

The beach cottage Serendipity stands almost as if it is the island’s sentinel at the northern edge of Rodanthe in the Mirlo Beach subdivision – the first house you encounter as you travel south on Hatteras through villages with many oceanfront houses.

The views from the house are magnificent with the ocean to the east and the sound to the west and the expanse of undeveloped Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge to the north.

When it was built in 1988 by Roger Meekins of Manteo, Serendipity was really large by Hatteras Island standards.  Those were the days when modest one-story “beach boxes” dominated the rental cottage market, and Serendipity was an attention getter.

In the past decade, it has gotten attention for being overwashed and surrounded by the ocean in every coastal storm.

After every storm, Hatteras islanders would ask each other, “Is Serendipity still there?”

Islanders became irritated that in every storm, it seemed, ocean water washed down the driveway of the cottage and closed Highway 12 to traffic.

Why, they asked, should persistent flooding from private property close a public highway, the only access to Hatteras Island?

So Serendipity became infamous.

However, in 2007, Serendipity became famous when it was transformed into the Inn at Rodanthe for the film “Nights in Rodanthe,” based on the Nicholas Sparks romantic novel and starring Richard Gere and Diane Lane.

Ironically, a northeaster that send tides soaring around the house and damaged some of Hollywood’s special effects delayed filming for several weeks.

With the release of the film in the fall of 2008, hundreds of fans began flocking to see the cottage and photograph it.  With every storm, The Island Free Press gets inquiries about whether or not the house has survived another ocean assault.

It was well built and continued to withstand the assaults, though the county is ready to make a move on the getting the house removed.

Dare’s commissioners have asked the state Department of Transportation to condemn and tear down Serendipity and several other Mirlo Beach oceanfront houses and to nourish the beach and strengthen the dunes in the area.

The state has so far made no move to do that.

Sturza says the county will “light a fuse,” to get the process going, but that several agencies are involved in the final solution.

“We just think it’s time,” Sturza said.

Serendipity’s septic tank and drainfield have been destroyed or damaged in several recent storms, including this week’s. Under current Coastal Area Management Act laws, an owner gets one exemption to replace it.

Sturza thinks Serendipity’s owners have had that chance.

He says a bigger issue is whether the house is still on private property or whether the beach has eroded so much that it is now in the intertidal zone -- state public trust waters.

Mo Clark, who is a caretaker of the property for the owners, Michael and Susan Creasy of Champion, Pa., says the house is still sturdy and sound, despite its beating by the ocean over the years.

Indeed, Roger Meekins built it to last.  The piling are driven down 14 feet and set in concrete.  However, Meekins says there was 400 feet of beach in front of the house when he built it 20 years ago.

Owner Susan Creasy said in a telephone interview yesterday that she and her husband are doing everything they can to comply with regulations and be responsible members of the community.

“We’ve just tried everything and gotten permit after permit,” she said.

The couple bought the house in 2003 just before Hurricane Isabel for $525,000. 

Susan Creasy says they are not rich oceanfront property owners who bought the house for speculation.

They fell in love with the house the first time they saw it and still love it and its setting on the edge of the Pea Island Wildlife Refuge.

“Everything we have is tied up in it,” she said. “We’ve kept paying our mortgage even though we’ve had no rent for two years.”

The Creasys have stayed in the house at times in the past two years, but it has not been rented because it has been condemned and uncondemned numerous times.

Susan Creasy said the couple has had the caretaker erect a sturdy dune in front of the house each winter to try to keep ocean tide from washing through the property during storms.

She said she isn’t sure what they will do next.

And the attempt to legally condemn the property as a nuisance appears that it could be a lengthy process of wrangling over regulations and legalities.

Meanwhile, the Creasys have the house for sale for $499,000.


TO READ ANOTHER STORY ABOUT SERENDIPITY AND ITS HISTORY AND PROBLEMS, GO TO http://www.islandfreepress.org/Archives/2007.11.29-ShootingTheBreeze-MirloBeach.html