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The complaint stated deBenedictis violated building regulations by allowing up to six unrelated persons to reside at her home on Canton Ave.
DeBenedictis has owned the home for several years. It is worth approximately $1.6 million, according to a recent real estate estimate.
Since last summer, deBenedictis has been renting it to Curry College students.
“They were operating it kind of like a dorm,” Building Commissioner Joseph Prondak said. “It has been a fairly long history. We’ve had complaints from neighbors going back to September.”
The home sits on historic land that was once a tavern. It has five bedrooms, four bathrooms and an indoor swimming pool. The complaints from neighbors were of late-night parties, underage drinking and disruptive behavior, Prondak said.
The building department has surveyed the home and run license plates through the police department. According to Prondak, a meeting with Curry officials determined that eight students were living there, two of them brothers. He said the building code allows for up to four unrelated persons to reside at one location, but “once you go over four, it’s considered a lodging house.”
DeBenedictis filed an appeal to the state building board Feb. 5 but lost, according to her attorney George Richardson. Richardson said she has taken “immediate steps” to conform to building regulations.
Immediately following the appeal, Prondak and Town Administrator Kevin Mearn were allowed to serve the violation notice. Prondak said when they went to the home there were only five students living there.
“A few of them had been given the boot, apparently,” he said. “The students didn’t know we were coming. We knocked on the door … there were just the two brothers and three other individuals living there.”
Richardson confirmed there are now only three unrelated persons at the residence.
Prondak said officials will “continue to keep an eye” on the situation.