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Palm Beach Daily News

$12.5 million home sale among top Palm Beach real estate transactions for season

By: Megan V. Winslow
Published: 5/23/2009Source: Palm Beach Daily News

The 2007-08 real estate season was the age of the mega-sale: 60 Blossom Way for $68.5 million, 1236 S. Ocean Blvd. for $81.5 million and 515 N. County Road for a whopping $95 million.

 

By those standards, any other island season would be a slouch, but 2008-09 suffered the one-two punch of the effects of the real estate bust and the unraveling of the Bernard Madoff scandal, which prompted a handful of investors to sell their local homes.

 

Palm Beach brokers may not have sold as many properties this season as they did in the past, but the prices for those that did sell remained strong, said Leslie Evans, local real estate attorney and publisher of The Evans Report real estate study.

 

Here's a sampling of some of the heftiest sales this season:

 

516 S. Ocean Blvd.

 

Vacant land

 

Sold for: $10.4 million on Oct. 1.

 

Asking price: about $11 million

 

Cable television entrepreneur John Scarpa bought No. 516 in 2005 for about $8 million with the idea of building a spec house on the vacant waterfront property.

 

But Scarpa's wife, Jana Scarpa of Barclays International Realty, also listed the half-acre property for sale in the $11 million range, and Robert and Amy Feldman of Pennsylvania made a $10.4 million offer the Scarpas couldn't resist.

 

The sale set a new record for "price per front foot" for land across the street from the ocean, said Dana Koch of The Corcoran Group, who represented the Feldmans in the sale.

 

700 S. Ocean Blvd.

 

Vacant land

 

Sold for: $11.75 million on Oct. 2

 

Asking price: $13.4 million

 

An Ohio limited liability company called 700 South Ocean sold this vacant waterfront piece of land to builder Paul Wittman and his partner, tabloid titan Peter Callahan, who planned to build a 10,000-square-foot Bermuda-style spec house on it.

 

The property encompasses about 27,000 square feet and includes a tunnel under Ocean Boulevard. The land once featured a 6,700-square-foot, plantation-style house that was home to Barton Gubelmann, the widow of cash register inventor Walter Gubelmann. The property last sold in May 2007 for $10.8 million, according to property records.

 

Wally Turner of Sotheby's represented both the buyer and seller.

 

255 Clarke Ave.

 

Single family home

 

Sold for: $9.68 million on Oct. 17

 

Asking price: $10.9 million

 

Former Innkeepers USA Chairman and CEO Jeffrey Fisher and his wife, Frances, sold the landmarked Casa Coral home to Margaret Sinclair and her husband, Christopher A. Sinclair, the former CEO and chairman of Pepsi-Cola.

 

The 9,158-square-foot Mediterranean-style home was designed by John Volk in 1927 for Alfred Feltman, of Coney Island hot dog fame.

 

The main residence has four bedrooms, three bathrooms and three half-baths.

 

The backyard is graced with fountains, a 44-foot lap pool and a guest house with two bedrooms and a four-car garage.

 

Corcoran Group broker Jim McCann represented the Fishers in the sale, and Bradford P. Miller of Bradford P. Miller Real Estate brought the Sinclairs to the table.

 

756 Slope Trail

 

Single family home

 

Sold for: $5.96 million on Feb. 5

 

Asking price: $7.99 million

 

Developer George L. Ford III built this 7,300-square-foot Mediterranean-style home and sold it to Christopher Dacamara Orthwein, son of Adolphus Busch Orthwein, former vice president of operations for Anheuser Busch Cos. The five-bedroom, 6 1/2-bath residence is situated atop a hill next to the town's historic Art Deco-style water building, and it overlooks the Palm Beach Country Club golf course.

 

Ford bought the property in 2004 for $1.83 million from the estate of former owner Oleda Casscells. At the time, it contained a Japanese-style house designed by Howard Major. That home was not landmarked and was torn down.

 

Michael Montgomery, of Jeffrey A. Cloninger & Associates Inc., represented Orthwein in the sale, and Scott Gordon, of Fite Shavell & Associates, represented Ford in the sale.

 

1620 S. Ocean Blvd. (pictured above).

 

Single-family home

 

Sold for: $12.5 million on March 1

 

Asking price: $13.9 million

 

Two prospective buyer bid over 1620 S. Ocean Blvd., and Laurence Abramson of West Palm Beach ultimately won with his $12.5 million offer.

 

The 10,111-square-foot, two-story Mediterranean home sits across South Ocean Boulevard from the beach and just north of Seagrape Circle. It features six bedrooms and eight- and-a-half baths.

 

Grand Estates Building & Design, of Boca Raton, purchased the property in March 2003 for $3.7 million from the family of Sidney P. Kriser. At the time, the property contained a small 1960s-era home, but Grand Estates tore that down to begin the spec house project in 2004.

 

Paulette Koch, of the Corcoran Group, represented Grand Estates, and her son, Dana Koch, also of Corcoran, represented Abramson.

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