Wellesley Executive Director Meghan Jop said during the June 5 Wellesley Housing Development Corp., meeting that the town has sent legal notice to the property owner of The Bristol luxury condo complex at 148 Weston Rd., regarding the dilapidated red house next door that the developer owns. The town said it has also sent zoning violation notices, and plans to fine the owner daily until work commences, she said. (See WDHC meeting recording from Wellesley Media at 28-minute mark.)
There are “multiple levels of concern” regarding the state of the adjacent property at 140 Weston Rd., Jop said. An old Bristol marketing sign this past week could be seen on the ground in front of the property.
People with access to $2M to $4M have been snapping up units at The Bristol, and moving in since last year. Part of the town’s deal with the developer was that the developer would get its 24 condo units if it agreed to renovate the historic house next door as a two-family affordable housing property. When we checked in on the status of this house with the town and owner (the owner didn’t reply to our inquiry) in March of 2024, the town was under the impression that work on 140 Weston Rd. would be starting soon.
As of the June 5 WHDC meeting, the main building had only been given a temporary certificate of occupancy, Jop said.
Under the development agreement, the town can complete the work on the adjacent property, though Jop said it would be better for the developer to do it. The original plan was to redevelop the property and maintain at least something of the historic nature of it. It was unclear from the WHDC meeting whether the developer had put up a bond for completion of the project.
Jop said The Bristol’s owner is also supposed to pay for its share of a traffic audit done in conjunction with the developer of the nearby Terrazza condo coplex (at one point, the two developments had the same owner). The property owner for The Bristol has not been responsive to date, according to the town.
We’ve reached out for comment from LYX Group, “a vertically integrated luxury real estate development company with a passion for design and architectural significance” listed on The Bristol website. We’ll update this post if we get a response.
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Further proof of the affordable housing scam the town has been running. The building commission lets developers build properties in areas that are highly congested already, Weston Rd, Linden Street, RT 9 and proposed on Cliff Rd and Washington street under the guise of our need for more affordable housing. Majority of units sell for over two million with set aside of two or three “affordable units” and in the case of the Bristol no units!! The towns traffic is terrible no more scam developments
The reality is that you simply can’t build affordable housing without public subsidies, unless the profits from many more market-rate units are used to fill the hole in the budget left by building income-restricted units. And of course, any public subsidies for affordable housing will go much further in places where the land doesn’t cost $2 million per acre (which, in Wellesley, it does). So the approach of having market-rate units “cross-subsidizing” others is, in my opinion, the best way of creating housing that moderate-income households can afford in Wellesley.
But The Bristol is a bad example of that. The town negotiated the number of affordable units to be much lower than the original 11 proposed so that they could avoid a (larger) Chapter 40B project. Of course, the developer should be held accountable to the development agreement. But the main reason why this development is a “scam” as you put it is that the neighbors didn’t want to entertain a project at a scale that would make it financially viable to build more affordable units.
Also, building in areas that are “highly congested already” is the most environmentally and fiscally responsible thing to do, and would likely come with fewer traffic impacts than if we built the new housing in far-flung corners of town.
Shocker that one of the developers Ms. Jop has been courting to build luxury condos in Wellesley isn’t following through on the promises made to the town.
That house was built by hand with purpose not profit over 250 years ago. Think of what the world was like then.
The intricate details inside tell a tale. The top step in the back is taller than the others to trip intruders alerting the occupants to protect themselves. The place has a history and soul and does not deserve such disrespect.
Bravo! My sentiments exactly! I loved the detail about the back stairs. And I wonder if any photos exist of the interior.