It was a modest house by this town’s standards … Its owner: Peter Brand, Harvard University’s legendary fencing coach. Its assessed value: $549,300. So when the house sold to a wealthy Maryland businessman for close to a million dollars in May 2016, the town’s top assessor was so dumbfounded that he wrote the following in his notes: ‘Makes no sense.'” Obviously, the town’s top assessor hasn’t been following the news very closely. Boston Globe: He bought the fencing coach’s house. Then his son got into Harvard.