I don’t know which is more remarkable: the price tag or the appreciation.
The 18,500-square-foot, 103-year-old Henry T. Sloane Mansion at 18 East 68th Street just went on sale for $64 million, the most expensive officially listed house ever in New York. I thought that rocker, Lenny Kravitz, had set the unbeatable bar a couple of years ago when he paid a reported $40 million for the Duke-Semans mansion on Fifth Avenue. But since then there have been several townhouse sales in the $50 mil range. Not surprisingly, many of them are owned by weasels financiers, probably paid for by fat Christmas bonuses.
Since none of us will probably ever set foot in a house this expensive, let’s take a virtual tour of this joint.
The outside is nice. Okay, it’s a mansion. Maybe it’s not the largest or most impressive crib in the neighborhood but, hey? No garage? Where do you store the garbage cans? And for $64 mil I want a second floor deck overlooking the peasants so I can pose like Mussolini. Something maintenance-free, maybe Trex. A few potted plants. Some string lights. Yeah.
The limestone could use a good cleaning. For this scratch, don’t you think the sellers could invest in a little curb appeal?
The entryway is impressive. I can see coming home from Abercrombie & Fitch to a roaring fire in that hearth.
But that marble floor… so Home Depot. For $64 mil I want a big compass rose or a coat of arms medallion or something.
This must have been the sitting room. Or maybe the ballroom. It would make a great media room, but where do you put the big screen TV?
Now, THIS is nice. Very homey, beautiful woodwork, another firepla… wait! Is that a window air conditioner?? For this cheese, the place doesn’t have central air?!
No wonder I can’t find any pictures of the kitchen. I bet there’s not even a Subzero in there.
That’s what $64 million buys you in New York City, folks. Or at least it does in 2008. Funny thing is, Sloan Mansion sold in 2003 for “just” $7.6 million. That’s right. It appreciated by $56 million in just five years. Actually, it sold for $20 million just last year. Do the math on that!
When they talk about the disappearing middle class and how we’re becoming a nation of poor working class slobs and the obscenely rich, this place proves the point.
