149 Main Street, Sandwich, Massachusetts
The Dan'l Webster Inn, from the outside in
Dave, you've looked at this inn more closely than anyone outside it. I wanted to see what the public record says on its own, so you can test it against your read. Keep what's useful and throw out the rest.
What I found
- The inn sold on 2 December 2022 for $6.6M, about $137K a room, to Jamsan Hotel Management. Eighteen months later a fire closed the kitchen for about a year, and the town logged a $750K kitchen-rebuild permit.
- Food came back in stages and now runs Wednesday to Sunday, lunch and dinner, with breakfast on weekends only. So there is no clean recent year of restaurant, event or holiday numbers to buy on.
- That gap, plus what the owner put in after the fire, probably set the asking price above what the books could prove. The upside I see is in three places: the kitchen, the spa in winter, and pairing it with Woodstock's season.
How to read the tags: Verified a dated public source says it. Estimate arithmetic on public benchmarks, assumptions shown. Open the record can't answer it; you or the seller can.
The story so far
- 1980 – 2022
The Catania family (Hearth 'n Kettle, the Cape Codder) owns and runs the inn for 42 years. At its peak, Thanksgiving alone fed 800–1,000 people. Verified CapeNews, Dec 2022
- 2 December 2022
The family's Dan'l Webster Trust sells for $6.6M, through JLL, to Jhm Hix Keene LLC of Lexington, part of Jamsan Hotel Management, a Holiday Inn Express operator. Deed Book 35517, Page 213. The same seller sold the Cape Codder in the same window; the two were reported together at $53.6M. Verified Town of Sandwich record card; JLL; WCAI, Dec 2022
- 11 June 2024
Fire behind the kitchen just before 1 a.m. It ran up the side of the building and the smoke cleanup was extensive. The rooms stayed open; the kitchen did not. In August the town issued a $750,000 kitchen-rebuild permit. Verified Boston Globe, Jun 2024; town permit C24-0054
- November 2024
No Thanksgiving dinner, with the kitchen still closed. Verified Cape Cod Times, Nov 2024
- June 2025
The Tavern reopens with a limited menu while the inn is still hiring an executive chef. Verified Cape Cod Times, Jun 2025
- Today
Lunch and dinner Wednesday to Sunday (11:30 a.m. to 8 or 8:30 p.m.), closed Monday and Tuesday. Breakfast Saturday and Sunday only; weekday guests get coffee. Thanksgiving 2026 is taking bookings again. Ticketed shows and a winter room-and-spa package suggest an owner working hard on the off-season. No public sale listing anywhere I checked. Verified danlwebsterinn.com October menu; LoopNet; Crexi; 19 Oct 2026
The property in numbers
Why it probably didn't pencil
I don't know what happened in your negotiation. These are the reasons the public record suggests, roughly in order of weight. My inference
- The owner's number and the buyer's number start from different places. Jamsan paid $6.6M, then carried a fire, a year without a kitchen and a rebuild permitted at $750K. An owner wants that back. A buyer can only pay for what the last few years prove.
- The last few years don't prove much. With no kitchen from June 2024 to mid-2025 and a short menu since, there's no clean year of food, events or holidays. The seller sells a projection; a buyer can't bank on one.
- Winter is long. At county averages, November to March brings in 15% of room revenue, while payroll, heat, insurance and debt run all year. A four-department house carries the most staff exactly when rooms bring in least.
- Old buildings hide costs. A site dating to 1692, last renovated around 2012, with a recent fire, a pool, a spa and a commercial kitchen. Roofs, mechanicals, fire safety, accessibility and septic can each move the price by six figures. Open Septic capacity in particular can quietly cap seats, events and rooms.
- Staff and housing. Year-round chefs, therapists and event staff on the Upper Cape are scarce and need somewhere to live.
The seasons, in room revenue
If the inn did exactly as well as the Barnstable County average in 2025, rooms would bring in about $1.80M a year. More than half arrives in June, July and August. Estimate
June to August: 55% of the year Other months, $K per month
Room revenue per available room for Barnstable County in 2025 (STR data published by the Cape Cod Chamber) × days in month × 48 rooms. January works out to $31 a room night, August to $270. The county set includes motels; a village inn with a spa and dining should beat it, and the $249 October rate points that way. Only the inn's own daily history can say by how much.
Four businesses under one roof Estimate
None of this is the inn's actual performance. It shows which assumptions move the answer.
| Business | What's public | Plausible yearly revenue | Assumption |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rooms | 48 rooms; $249 October rate; county series | $1.8M – $2.3M | County average up to 25% better |
| Restaurant and Tavern | Five days a week; 2,106 OpenTable reviews, 4.6 stars; past Thanksgivings of 800–1,000 | $1.0M – $1.8M | 250 days × 100–150 covers × $40–48 |
| Events and weddings | 70–150 guests indoors; packages from $125 a head | $0.4M – $0.8M | 25–45 events × ~110 guests × ~$135, plus fees and bar |
| Beach Plum Spa | Open to the public; winter packages | $0.3M – $0.6M | 2,500–4,500 treatments × ~$125–135 |
| Total | ≈ $3.5M – $5.5M | Gross revenue, not profit |
Rooms make the money; food, events and the spa carry the winter. On about $4.5M of revenue, the gap between a 12% and a 22% house margin is roughly $450K a year. At a 9–10% cap rate that's $4–5M of value. That spread is the whole argument about price. Estimate
How it compares on the Cape
| Property | Rooms | Price or status | Per room | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dan'l Webster Inn, Sandwich | 48 | Sold $6.6M, Dec 2022 | $137.5K | Price set before the fire |
| Spring Garden Inn Motel, East Sandwich | 12 | Listed $1.5M, Aug 2026 | $125K | Rooms-only floor, same town |
| Old Manse Inn, Brewster | 12 | Listed $2.795M | $233K | Historic inn with dining |
| Liberty Hill Inn, Yarmouth Port | 9 | Listed $2.45M | $272K | Small Route 6A inn, owner-operator price |
| Unnamed inn, Route 6A | 10 | Listed $3.35M, reduced Jun 2026 | $335K | Includes the owner's house |
| Belfry Inn & Bistro, Sandwich | ~20–30 | Operating, not for sale | — | Nearest like-for-like for rate and events |
Small inns list high per room because the price includes a lifestyle and the owner's unpaid labor. A 48-room, four-department inn trades on earnings, so these rows set a floor and a ceiling rather than a price. For rate and events, the competition that matters is the Belfry, Heritage Museums & Gardens for weddings, the Heritage House Inn, and the resorts in Falmouth and Hyannis. Listings from LoopNet, The B&B Team and Dana Moos, checked 19 Oct 2026.
Three levers
Rebuild the kitchen's reputation, then sell the whole weekend
This was a house that fed a thousand people at Thanksgiving, and it lost a year of that. A seven-day kitchen, sold together with the rehearsal dinner, the wedding, the brunch and the spa, makes food the reason groups book rather than a cost line. Heritage Museums & Gardens is a mile away and hosts weddings that need rooms.
Use the spa to fill the five thin months
Beach Plum Spa is open to the public, which counts most in January. Local memberships, gift cards and midweek spa-dinner-room packages, priced by day of the week rather than discounted. The current winter package shows the demand is there.
Pair it with Woodstock's calendar
Woodstock is strongest in foliage season and over the winter holidays; the Cape is strongest June to August. One owner with both could share managers, sales, events staff and a guest list across two seasons that only partly overlap, and keep good people employed all year. Both draw from the same Boston and New York drive-in market, so a cross-sell between the two costs almost nothing to try.
Under all three: price by room type, date and stay length, and push direct booking. I wouldn't count on broad rate growth until a paid STR comparison and the inn's own history back it.
What I'm curious about
You know things no public record does. I'd love to hear your take on any of these.
- What was the number, or the issue, that made it not pencil: price, terms, condition, or the books?
- Was your offer part of the 2022 Catania sale, or a later approach to Jamsan?
- Did you get to see each department on its own (rooms, food, events, spa), or one blended statement?
- How did the fire change the conversation? Was the claim settled, and who paid for the rebuild?
- What did you find behind the walls: septic, roofs, fire safety?
- Would you run the restaurant yourself, or bring in a partner the way you did with Oakes & Evelyn at The Jackson?
- Does Woodstock and the Cape actually work together, for staff and for guests, or is it nicer on paper?
- What price or structure would get you to look again? A seller note, an earn-out tied to the food coming back, a lease with an option?
- Who else looked at it, and what do you think they missed?
Sources
All public. Accessed 19 October 2026 unless noted.
- The Sandwich Enterprise / CapeNews, "Dan'l Webster Inn Sells For $6.6 Million", 7 Dec 2022: four buildings; 34,386 sq ft.
- JLL newsroom, "Sale of historic Cape Cod boutique hotel closes", 5 Dec 2022: JLL represented Catania Hospitality Group.
- CAI / WCAI, "Sandwich inn sold for $6 million", 7 Dec 2022: buyer Jamsan Hotel Management, per the Registry of Deeds.
- Bisnow Boston deal sheet, 4 Dec 2023, citing the Boston Business Journal: Cape Codder and Dan'l Webster reported together at $53.6M.
- Boston Globe and Patch, 11 Jun 2024: fire behind the kitchen at 12:54 a.m.
- Cape Cod Times, via OpenTable: no Thanksgiving (26 Nov 2024); Tavern reopens with limited menu (18 Jun 2025). OpenTable listing: 4.6 from 2,106 reviews.
- danlwebsterinn.com: 48 rooms; affiliations (Jamsan Hotel Management); dining hours on the October 2026 menu page; events; winter package.
- Town of Sandwich assessor, FY2026 property record card, parcel 73-18-0 (assessedvalues2.com, jurisdiction 261): assessed $6,508,600; sale 12/02/2022, $6.6M, Book 35517 Page 213, grantor Dan'l Webster Trust; permits C24-0054 ($750,000 kitchen) and C24-0046. FY2026 rate $10.19 per $1,000.
- Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce Regional Data Center: STR monthly occupancy, rate and revenue per room for Barnstable County, 2018–2026.
- Expedia: $249 lowest price for 22 Oct 2026 (as of 22 Sep 2026); pool closed 3 Oct – 29 May.
- Travel Weekly hotel record: site from 1692, last renovated 2012. A trade listing; treat as indicative.
- LoopNet, The B&B Team, Dana Moos: comparable inn listings as shown.
- WeddingWire: wedding packages from $125 a head.
- Seven Days (VT), Apr 2025: Oakes & Evelyn opening at The Jackson.