85-Year-Old Naples Cottage Listed for $14.5M as Market Shifts

An old cottage dating back to 1940 just hit the Naples market for $14.5 million this February, offering a rare opportunity to own one of the area's few remaining historic homes.

Located at 88-66 11th Ave. S., this old beauty sits on a double lot — 170 by 150 feet — just a short walk from the beach. Built with heart pine and cypress, the home features three bedrooms and two baths, showing off the workmanship from Naples' early years. It was last restored in 2022 after the cottage took signifcant damage from Hurricane Ian.

The Whaley family from Kentucky has owned this house for four generations until recently when Suzanne "Mama Sue" Whayne Whaley died at 102 last year. 

Because of skyrocketing property values, a lot of homebuyers opt for new, larger homes rather than preserving the older cottages.

"One of the problems is that Old Naples has become such a tremendously popular neighborhood now," Lodge McKee, the exclusive listing agent with Premier Sotheby’s International Realty in Naples, told Naples Daily News. "The sand beneath the houses has literally turned to gold dust, and if you are going to build a house on something that's worth millions of dollars just for the lot, you are urged by connotation to build the biggest one that you can."

There's only one cottage left in Naples that is safe from demolition. Palm Cottage, which was built in 1895, is registered as a landmark in the National Register of Historic Places.