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January 2007 |
A Publication of ELLIOTT®
& Company Appraisers |
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FORBES.COM LISTS 10 MOST
EXPENSIVE HOME SALES OF 2006 |
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 Forbes.com
has released its annual list of the most expensive homes sold in the
United States. The 10 most expensive homes sold in 2006 are:
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Alpine, NJ - $58 million
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A
10,000 square foot English-style country house was built in the
1930s by the Henry Clay Frick family. The 63-acre estate was
purchased by real estate investor Richard Kurtz. The estate includes
two guest cottages, three greenhouses, tennis courts and a swimming
pool.
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New York, NY - $53 million
- The Harkness Mansion on East 75th Street was purchased last year by
Christopher Flowers, whom Forbes has ranked as the 322nd wealthiest
American. The 22,000 square foot neo-French Renaissance townhouse
was built in 1896 and purchased in 1987 by producers Jaqui Safra and
Jean Doumanian. Last year’s sale of the mansion was the largest
single residential real estate transaction in the history of
Manhattan.
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Palm Beach, FL - $50 million
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Financier Henry Kravis purchased the 15,255 square foot home from
Joyce Fisher, widow of Robert Fisher, who invented the seatbelt. The
previous local record for a home sale was $27.5 million, set by
actor Sylvester Stallone, when he sold his villa in 1999. Kravis's
new home sits on five acres along Lake Worth.
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Carbondale, CO - $47 million
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Crystal Island Ranch was purchased last year by Sony Records
executive Tommy Mottolla. The 12,000 square-foot four-bedroom
mansion sits on 949 acres near the base of Mount Sopris. The estate
also includes an 18-acre lake. The sale was the largest single
residential real estate transaction in Colorado history.
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New York, NY - $40 million
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Duke-Semans mansion was bought by real estate and oil entrepreneur
Tamir Sapir from the relatives of Doris Duke. It stands across Fifth
Avenue from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The seven-story tall
residence features a mansard roof and pedaled-glass marquee. The
former cab driver, who now owns it, is expected to spend $10 million
to renovate the place.
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Malibu, CA - $35 million
- Teodoro
Nguema Obiang, son of the president of Equatorial Guinea, purchased
the 15,000, eight-bedroom mansion located just off the Pacific Coast
Highway. The estate includes a four-hole golf course, tennis courts,
swimming pools and views of the ocean and downtown Los Angeles.
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Miami Beach - $31 million to $35
million
- High-rise developer Ugo Colombo purchased the 21,000
square foot Italian Renaissance mansion for the undetermined amount.
Carl Fisher, a principal developer of Miami Beach, once owned the
12-bedroom waterfront residence, which also has an 85-foot-high
observation tower.
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New York, NY - $30 million
- An
unnamed hedge-fund executive purchased the converted duplex
penthouse at 823 Park Ave. The 7,500 square-foot former home of John
D. Rockefeller Jr. has 10-foot ceilings and a 3,000 square foot
terrace. It also is expected to be extensively renovated.
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Carpinteria, CA - $28.5 million
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Actor Kevin Costner purchased the oceanfront property near Santa
Barbara. The five-bedroom house sits on an estate with bluffs,
stables, a polo field and 950 feet of beach. As he purchased his
latest field of dreams, Costner sold his Hollywood Hills home to
Ryan Seachrist, host of American Idol, for $11.5 million.
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Malibu, CA - $25 million
- Another
undisclosed buyer bought the 7,000 square foot, five-bedroom
ocean-side mansion from Michael Klein, son of former San Diego
Chargers owner Eugene Klein. Klein had owned the property, including
its beachfront pool, since 1999.
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LOUISIANA DROPS AVMs, ALLOWS FULL APPRAISALS
IN KATRINA-
DAMAGE ASSESSMENT |
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 Automated
Valuation Models (AVMs) have been discontinued as a method for
determining pre-storm values of homes of Katrina victims. On December
20, Gov. Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana announced policy changes in the
Road Home program. Road Home provides rebuilding grants of up to
$150,000 to aid New Orleans residents who suffered home damage from
Hurricane Katrina.
Until Blanco's announcement, AVMs were the primary valuation tools
determining pre-storm values of the homes damaged by Katrina. The
Citizens Road Home Action Team, a group of New Orleans residents
lobbying for affected homeowners, argued that this form of home
valuation has led to lower rebuilding grants, often unfairly.
Homeowners, vying for grants, can now hire Louisiana certified appraisers
to inspect the damaged property and determine its value before the
storm. Broker price opinions, which were commonly used for damage
assessment outside of New Orleans, have been used less since the
governor's announcement.
"These changes make sense when you consider how diverse the New Orleans
housing market is," said Sen. Ann Duplessis. "We have an entire team of
local professionals, dedicated to the real estate and housing industry,
and they will now play a vital role in making the Road Home program work
better for our people."
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FORMER FORD HOME FOR
SALE AT $999K |
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The house in Alexandria, VA, that the late Gerald Ford lived in,
when he became president of the United States and, before that,
was vice president and, earlier, minority leader of the U.S.
House of Representatives, is up for sale.
Javad Khakbaz, the current
owner of the historic house, recently reduced his asking price
from $1.05 million to $999,000. The two-story, four-bedroom
house stands on a quarter-acre lot at 514 Crown View Drive and
has, among other features, a re-enforced driveway to support
limousines.
Ford owned the house
for 20 years, buying it when he was a U.S. Congressman from
Grand Rapids, MI. In August 1974, when he was living in this
house as vice president, Ford learned that President Richard
Nixon was about to resign and that he would become president. In
fact, he remained in the house for the first 11 days of his
presidency. Since the Fords moved eight miles away to the White
House and eventually sold the house that is currently on the
market, it has changed hands twice and has been used as rental
property.
Meanwhile, John Edwards, who recently announced that he is
actively seeking the 2008 Democratic nomination for president,
sold his Washington, DC, home in Georgetown for $5.2 million.
Edwards purchased the six-bedroom home on P Street for $3.8
million in 2002 when he was a U.S. Senator. After being defeated
for vice president
in 2004, the former medical malpractice lawyer returned to North
Carolina and built a house on a 100-acre estate in Chapel Hill.
Edwards was seeking $5.6 million for the Georgetown home less
than a week before it sold. |
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QUOTES OF WIT &
WISDOM |
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"There are painters who transform the sun to a yellow spot,
but there are others who, with the help of their art and
their intelligence, transform a yellow spot to the sun."
- Pablo Picasso
"Courage is the art of being the only one who knows you’re
scared to death." -
Harold Wilson
"We can't all be heroes because somebody has to sit on the
curb and clap as they go by." -
Will Rogers
"Defining and analyzing humor is a pastime of humorless
people."
- Robert Benchley
"To acquire knowledge, one must study, but to acquire
wisdom, one must observe." -
Marilyn vos Savant
"Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth."
- Franklin Roosevelt
"The more I want to get something done, the less I call it
work." - Richard Bach
"Democracy consists of choosing your dictators after they've
told you what you think it is you wanted to hear."
- Alan Corenk
"What some call health, if purchased by perpetual anxiety
about diet, isn't much better than tedious disease."
- George Dennison Prentice
"Experience teaches only the teachable" -
Aldous Huxley
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