We have some really juicy Celebrity News this week courtesy of Zillow.com including a Madonna Farm in the Hamptons, Walter Cronkite's Co-op, a Falcon and a Porsche, and Nora Jone fighting over some windows!
Madonna Buying Farm in Hamptons?
By: Paula Siegel, Release PM | January 4, 2010
Is Madonna really a country girl at heart?
Earlier this year Madonna purchased a town home (actually two) on E 81st on New York’s Upper East Side. The two-entry Georgian mansion reportedly sold for $40 million and is one of the most expensive sales on the Upper East Side. The four story town-home will require a number of renovations and security upgrades before Madonna moves in, but it’s already quite a gem with 13 bedrooms, 14 bathrooms, a two-car garage, 3,000 sq ft garden, nine fireplaces, wine cellar with a grotto, and an elevator. All this in Manhattan.
Now, Madonna has reportedly purchased Kelly Klein’s (Calvin Klein’s ex-wife) 26-acre Wild Ocean Farm in the Bridgehampton area of Long Island. Wild Ocean Farm is zoned for agriculture and was purchased for nearly $10 million. The property is currently used as a show-horse training center and will be kept as such when Madge takes over.
Walter Cronkite’s UN Plaza Co-op Listed for $2,995,000
By: Diane Tuman, Zillow Content Manager | December 18, 2009
The New York City co-op of “the most trusted man in America” — the late Walter Cronkite — is now on the market for $2.995 million.
Cronkite’s United Nations Plaza apartment is being listed by Joanna Simon, Cronkite’s companion in his later years and the sister of singer Carly Simon, according to Curbed.com.
Cronkite’s Turtle Bay-area apartment is a south and west-facing unit and is “currently configured as a grand living/dining room, eat-in kitchen, double-size master bedroom suite with his and her baths, library or 2nd bedroom with full bath, third bedroom (or maid’s room) with full bath plus an additional powder room. There is extremely generous closet space throughout. The unobstructed river views through floor to ceiling windows are unsurpassed in the building. With the purchase of this apartment also comes the right to buy an additional staff/guest suite on the 7th floor.”
The New York Observer offers some interesting background on what led Cronkite to the purchase of the UN Plaza place and how he and Simon “began to keep company” after the deaths of both of their longtime spouses.
Falcons TE Tony Gonzalez Spices Up Listing With Porsche
By: Diane Tuman, Zillow Content Manager | January 6, 2010
For $3,600,000 not only do you get sweeping views of the Pacific Ocean from the rooftop deck of a house located two blocks to the beach, but if you close on the home with a full-price offer, you will get a 2010 Porsche 911 Convertible.
Pretty sweet, if you need a car that is worth approximately $88,000. Kicking in the Porsche is none other than Atlanta Falcons tight end Tony Gonzalez whose Manhattan Beach, CA house has been on the market for over a year. The beach house was completely remodeled in 2004, and from the sounds of it, the rooftop deck is the place to hang out. It has 1,700 sq ft with three separate sections and includes lounge chairs, a built-in grill, sound system and a bed (photo above).
Oh, and if you do offer full price, you can slip the Porsche into one of the bays of the 4-car garage.
Gonzalez listed the home back in October 2008 for $3,999,999, but hasn’t been able to move it. Maybe the Porsche will do the trick, although in a CNN article, National Association of Realtors Vice President Elizabeth Blakeslee warns against “gimmicks” to sell a house:
“In my 18 years as a Realtor, I have never known anyone who has actually received whatever it was, the trip or the car,” said Blakeslee, “It’s generally negotiated away during the process of the buying or selling negotiations.”
Norah Jones in a Fight for Windows on Her Townhouse
By: Diane Tuman, Zillow Content Manager | January 8, 2010
(Photo above courtesy The Brooklyn Paper)
Hell hath no fury like dealing with an historic board or preservation society. Just ask singer Norah Jones who wants to install windows in a windowless wall of her townhouse in the Cobble Hill area of Brooklyn (photo above).
According to Curbed, which has dubbed this WindowGate, Jones is backtracking from putting 10 windows into the side of her Amity Street townhouse to 7 windows. And The Brooklyn Paper goes deeper, reporting that the “kerfuffle over the windows into Jones’s home began in late November, when preservationists discovered that Jones’s plan for renovations to her backyard — which had already been approved — had been secretly amended to now include the 10 new windows punched through the side façade.
What’s the big deal over adding windows to a home you own? For anyone who has dealt with preservationists (like Steve Jobs who wanted to tear down his house in Woodside, CA), the windows would introduce a “radical change in the aesthetic of Cobble Hill.” Evidently, most of these rowhomes were built between 1827 and 1845 in the Greek Revival style with a premium on preserving privacy.
