Bedrooms: 7 Bathrooms: 6 full + 2 half Lot: 0.97 ha / 2.4 acres
Amenities: 300+ ft of Atlantic frontage, views of 5 lighthouses, 180-degree ocean views, sandy beach access on Staples Cove, exercise room, wood-paneled sauna, 4-car garage
A Cape Elizabeth oceanfront estate is on the market for $16,500,000 with Sam Michaud of Legacy Properties Sotheby’s International Realty, making it the most expensive residential listing currently for sale in Maine.
Known as Staples Point, the property is set on 2.4 acres (0.97 hectares) on Casco Bay, with more than 300 feet of waterfront and views of five lighthouses. It is in Cape Elizabeth’s Two Lights area, about 15 minutes south of Portland.
The house was completed in 2016 by Maine architectural designer Joe Waltman, with Wright-Ryan as builder. Waltman calls it a “shingled Dutch Colonial” and says historical design elements were deliberately incorporated because, as he puts it, “new architecture is always an accumulation of the past.”
The result is a house that reads as a traditional New England coastal residence, but with the scale and amenities of a contemporary luxury home. Its broad gambrel roof, dormer windows, stone chimneys and three cupolas reinforce that traditional character, while Architectural Digest has also noted farmhouse influences.
Staples Point is part of a much longer body of residential work by Waltman along the Maine coast. His first completed house dates to 1973, and his work has ranged across several architectural styles, often responding to the site rather than following a fixed aesthetic. Here, the openness of the land allowed for 180-degree views of the Atlantic, while larger windows were used throughout so the surrounding lighthouses remain visible from room to room.
“It’s almost as if the lighthouse follows you from room to room,” Waltman said.
Those views include Portland Head Light, Maine’s oldest lighthouse, built under the orders of George Washington, and Cape Elizabeth’s Two Lights, famously painted by Edward Hopper.
The Lighthouse at Two Lights, 1929 by Edward Hopper
Portland Head Light is older than the state of Maine itself and nearly as old as the United States. Construction began in 1787, when present-day Maine was still part of Massachusetts, after George Washington engaged local masons to build a lighthouse at the entrance to Portland Harbor. The tower was completed in 1790 and first lit the following year.
More than a century later, the same coastline became closely associated with Edward Hopper, one of the best-known American painters of the 20th century. Hopper spent the summer of 1927 in Cape Elizabeth, repeatedly painting its lighthouses and coastal landscape. His paintings of Two Lights helped turn the lighthouse and surrounding coast into enduring images of Maine in American art.
The three cupolas are another traditional element of the house. Waltman describes them as both an architectural detail and a source of light after dark.
Inside, the residence spans 7,371 ft² (685 m²), with 7 bedrooms, 6 full bathrooms and 2 half bathrooms.
The main living, dining and kitchen spaces are arranged in an open plan facing the water. Hardwood floors and white walls run through much of the house, with multi-pane windows framing the coastline. There are several additional living spaces, an exercise room, a wood-paneled sauna overlooking the water and a 4-car garage.
Outside, lawns extend toward the rocky shoreline, and the property has access to a sandy beach on Staples Cove.
The $16.5 million asking price places Staples Point at the top of a market that remains relatively small compared with established East Coast summer destinations such as Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard and the Hamptons.
Michaud said 4 properties in Maine sold for more than $10 million last year, and he expects that pace to continue. The highest sale in the state over the past decade remains David Rockefeller’s former summer residence on Mount Desert Island, which sold for $19 million in 2018. More recent benchmark transactions include a Cape Elizabeth estate once owned by Bette Davis, which sold for $13.4 million in 2025 and was also represented by Michaud, and a Kennebunkport oceanfront home that sold for $12 million the same year.
Michaud believes buyers who might once have focused on Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard or the Hamptons are increasingly considering Maine, where comparable oceanfront properties can still trade at a different level.
“What separates Staples Point is that its greatest assets can’t be bought or built,” Michaud said. “The real luxury is owning a piece of coastline that simply has no substitute. The land, the frontage, the five lighthouse views, the privacy and the proximity to Portland cannot be replicated.”
He estimates that a comparable property in Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard or the Hamptons could command $40 million or more.
“Staples Point has the pedigree of those markets without the premium,” he said. “In real estate, rarity determines value, and Staples Point is about as rare as it gets.”
In his recent outlook on the state’s luxury market, Michaud has argued that Maine’s best properties are increasingly being considered against comparable homes in more established coastal destinations, rather than only against previous sales within the state. For the highest end of the market, he points to a finite supply of prime ocean frontage, large coastal parcels and properties that combine privacy, acreage, architecture and access.
All photographs courtesy of the listing agency. See more on Legacy Sotheby’s International Realty.
