A heron wades in a tidal pool on the Rhode Island Country Club.

One sign that Nayatt Point is one of Barrington’s priciest neighborhoods is the level of property taxation imposed on houses in the Narragansett Bay waterfront community.

The most expensive house on the market in Barrington this month, a 15-room mansion at 85 Nayatt Rd., built in 2005 for the family of golfer Brad Faxon, has an annual tax bill of $53,000, according to the listing information. The 12,261-square-foot house is on the market for $7,950,000, a princely sum even by this neighborhood’s standards.

The comparatively moderately priced ($2,895,000) 1967 ranch house for sale at 4 Nayatt Point Court, which has five bedrooms, five full bathrooms and one half bathroom, three fireplaces, a renovated kitchen, an inground pool with a 12-person Jacuzzi and a four-car garage, has a reported annual tax bill of $29,525.

The least expensive property for sale in Nayatt Point last week, priced at $1,175,000, is a 1950 contemporary at 11 Elm Lane with five bedrooms, three full bathrooms, one half bathroom and an inground pool. Annual property taxes are $17,860.

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Nayatt Point, in Barrington

Overall, Barrington had a 50-percent drop in high-end sales last year; there was a high of 27 of them in 2007, including a $2.7-million sale at 93 Nayatt Rd. and a $3.5 million sale at 33 Nayatt Rd.

Today, the Rhode Island Country Club, which owns 280 acres in the Point area, is the neighborhood’s best-known landmark. But from 1848 until about 1900, the Nayatt area was a center for brick manufacturing. Land for the club’s 18-hole golf course, designed in 1911, was purchased from the brick company.

The Nayatt Brick Company was founded in 1848, and in 1864 it was incorporated as the Narragansett Brick Company.

The end of Nayatt Road is also home to a little-known beach area that has been the source of an ongoing legal dispute between Nayatt Road property owner Cecil Sartor and local fishermen. Last month, two Barrington residents, Katherine Imbrie, a former Providence Journal reporter, and Philip C. Paige, were charged after allegedly removing boundary markers placed at the site by Sartor’s husband.

Laura Ricketson-Dwyer of the state’s Coastal Resources Management Council said the Daunis Right of Way to the beach at the end of Nayatt Road is a designated right of way, with two off-road parking spaces. The town has posted no-parking signs on the road itself; these, along with boulders placed on the path of the right of way, present an unwelcoming message. There is a CRMC sign there proclaiming it is a public access point.

Sartor, who lives at 11 Nayatt Rd. in a house purchased by her father in 1949 — her maiden name is Daunis — said she has challenged the legality of the right of way. Sartor said the Daunis Right of Way is the only public beach access point in town where people are allowed to park overnight, and she said this sometimes leads to noise and drinking in the area late at night.

Sartor said the area has long been a popular place to fish, and that when her father bought the house, there was a small bait shop across the street; the owner also rented boats. But this business was wiped out in the 1954 hurricane, she said.

POPULATION:

(Barrington, 2000) 16,891

MEDIAN HOUSE PRICE:

(Barrington, 2007) $433,500

INTERESTING FACT:

The Nayatt Point Lighthouse is now a private residence; its keeper’s cottage, built in 1828, is the oldest keeper’s quarters in Rhode Island, according to the Barrington Preservation Society.

cdunn@projo.com