500 Bay Condos for Sale

Living in 500 Bay

500 Bay is a bayfront building on Bay Avenue in Ocean City, built in 1977 and squared off on its lot — which is the single most useful thing to understand before you shop it. The building is a cube, and it tells you so in the unit numbers: a suffix of N or S is the exposure, and the exposure is what you are actually buying. Some homes face the bay and the sunset, some face the street, and two units of identical square footage can sit a world apart on price for that reason alone. Ask which way it looks before you ask anything else.

The mix runs mostly to two-bedroom, two-bath homes from roughly 1,100 to just under 1,500 square feet, with one-bedrooms at the smaller end and three-bedroom homes above 1,600 at the top of the building. Shared amenities are deeper than the vintage suggests: a heated bayfront pool with a separate kiddie pool, an outside sundeck and covered patio, a gazebo, a bayfront clubhouse and community room with a full kitchen, a fitness room looking out over the water, secure storage for beach equipment and bikes, dual elevators, and assigned covered garage parking. Building access is secured and management is on site. The kiddie pool is a small detail that says a lot — this is a building that expects grandchildren.

Two house rules decide the purchase for some buyers, so here they are up front. 500 Bay runs a strict no-pet policy, with exceptions only for certified service animals — if you are bringing a dog, Bay Club down the avenue is pet friendly and is the better call. And there is a one-time buy-in fee due from the buyer at closing, which is standard here but catches people who did not budget for it.

The community is primarily owner-occupied rather than rental-driven, which shows in how the place is kept and in the fact that the association has been willing to fund real maintenance work rather than defer it. One thing to raise early with any lender: financing in older bayfront associations can be its own conversation, and 500 Bay's lending status has moved over the past couple of years. Ask which lenders are currently writing in the building before you get attached to a unit — it is a five-minute question that occasionally reshapes a whole purchase, and it is why cash has featured heavily in the recent sales record here.

The location is the payoff. You are minutes from the beach and the boardwalk and an easy walk to the shops and restaurants on Asbury Avenue, with front-row views of the bay's boating traffic, the Night in Venice parade and the fireworks. If you are weighing water on both sides, compare against Ocean City bayfront homes and the beach side at beachfront. Other bay-side buildings worth a look are Sunset Harbour and Harbor House, or work through every building at once on the Ocean City condos page.