Estate Management

Someone who knows the house.

An old house asks for attention in a particular order — gutters before the frost, shutters before the storms, the slate before the leak. We hold that calendar, keep the records, and stand between the house and the dozen trades who pass through it.

WHAT STEWARDSHIP COVERS

Four standing responsibilities

I. The seasonal calendar

A year laid out in advance — masonry and roof in spring, mechanicals before winter, windows and millwork on their own cycle. Nothing waits until it becomes an emergency.

II. Trades & vendor coordination

We hold the relationships — the roofer who knows slate, the plasterer who knows lime, the millworker who has the profiles on file — and we meet them at the house so you needn't.

III. The property record

Every repair, specification, paint formula, and invoice, filed and photographed. The archive most old houses lose with each change of hands — kept, and handed on.

IV. Condition walkthroughs

Twice a year we walk the house with a preservationist's eye and write up what has moved, opened, or begun to fail — with a recommendation and a cost for each.

Who this is for

The great Main Line houses that are still standing.

Estates built for a staff of a dozen are now kept by one or two people who love them. We are the help that used to live on the property.

Owners of a large historic estate

Twenty rooms, a carriage house, a slate roof, and grounds — the houses of Gladwyne, Villanova, Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Radnor were designed to be looked after full-time. Most no longer are.

Anyone who feels behind on the house

If the list has grown longer than the year, and you aren't sure what is urgent versus what has been that way since 1974 — that is the ordinary condition of a big old house, not a failure. We sort the list and take it on.

Owners who would rather not manage the trades

A dozen contractors a year, each needing to be found, vetted, scheduled, and met at the door. You can hand that to us entirely.

Families holding a house across generations

An inherited property comes with the house but rarely the knowledge of how to run it. We hold the record so what your family learned over decades isn't lost in a single handover.

CURRENTLY IN OUR CARE

A private estate in Bryn Mawr

Our standing engagement — and the house that taught us what this service should be. It has a seasonal calendar, a documented record of every trade who has worked on it, and two condition reviews a year.

It is, in the truest sense, a house being kept rather than repaired. Out of respect for the family, we keep the particulars to ourselves — we're glad to speak to the work in person.

  • Ongoing, full stewardship

  • Seasonal calendar, trades coordination, property archive, semiannual review