Hot Sales & Listings…

With a dollop of Hamptons gossip 

Whale of a Sale
Tracy Anderson, fitness guru to the stars, has also been a longtime Sag Harbor resident. She recently splashed out on a Captain’s Row Greek Revival house formerly owned by Captain George S. Tooker. 286 Main Street was asking $3.59 million, listed by Corcoran’s Mala Sander. One of the nice things about houses on Captain’s Row is that they’re usually on larger plots than most in downtown Sag Harbor; Anderson’s new digs sits on 0.25 of an acre and includes a pool. The 3,445-square-foot house still includes original doors, molding, high ceilings, five fireplaces and gorgeous wide-plank wooden floors. Good taste, Tracy.

Trailer Treasure
Have you been thinking to yourself lately, “Why, I’d love the ease and convenience of living in a single-wide trailer home? But darn it, they’re just too low-priced for me!” you are in luck! An oceanfront “condo” in Montauk Shores has come on the market (listed by Betsy Cronley at Corcoran) asking just $1.65 million. Stop laughing. You’ll be rubbing shoulders with fellow owners like Jimmy Buffett and billionaire Daniel Loeb. It’s not unknown for owners to spend a million dollars upgrading the interiors of their trailers as well. Unit 14, the one for sale, is just 595 square feet, but the trailer can easily be removed, and an upgraded, larger unit put in its place.

Bioscleave Forever
This inventive, experimental house was built in 2008 and cost more than $2 million to build. The Bioscleave House – known as the Lifespan Extending Villa – was designed by artist couple Madeline Gins and Arakawa to cheat death itself. (It didn’t work. They’ve both since died.) They thought that continually stimulating the senses through architectural surprise would stimulate the immune system. There are two connected houses on the 1.1-acre property, with 4 bedrooms, 2 full and one half-bath. The original house is a 1960s A-frame designed by Carl Koch. The property was put back on the market in 2018 asking $2.5 million; the owners were hoping someone would buy it, move the house (possibly to a museum site), and save it from demolition. But this isn’t exactly the old Pennsylvania Station. No one wants this house. Now that the asking price is $975,000, it’s at land value. Is even that cheap enough, considering teardown costs? Stay tuned.

Farewell to Arbor
The Arbor, one of Marc Rowan’s Hamptons restaurants, is in contract to be sold. The place seemed like a dud from the start. Starting with the name — what does an arbor have to do with Montauk? — continuing with the location, basically the Gateway to the LIRR, and ending with the food, which was OK, but should have been more memorable given the prices. We’ll be interested to see the next iteration of this property.

Some Win, Some Lose
Updates on two selling prices: “Twin Peaks,” in Olde Town Southampton, sold after 5.5 years on the market. The property, with a last ask of $39.5 million, closed for $34.5 million, the most ever paid for a non-waterfront residence in the Hamptons. Congrats to Kean Development. Commiseration to pharma billionaire Stewart Rahr, who sold Burnt Point, his 24-acre estate on the Wainscott side of Georgica Pond. The sales price was $47 million, which is only $2 million more than Rahr paid for it in 2005. Ouch. At the time, Burnt Point was the most expensive home ever sold in New York State.

Moving on Over
The writer Kati Marton is selling the house in the Hamptons that she shared with her late husband, the diplomat Richard C. Holbrooke. Her latest book, “The Chancellor,” a biography of Angela Merkel, will be published in October. The 3,400-square-foot house, on North Sea Harbor, is now too big for her, so she is looking to relocate to Sag Harbor. Asking price is $4.65 million, listed with Lawrence Ingolia and Jonathan Smith of Sotheby’s International Realty. The property features wonderful views of Conscience Point, Towd Point and Peconic Bay, and there are parterre gardens, a hedged pool, and a detached barn.

More Tracy Anderson News!
Well, sort of. A commercial building in the middle of East Hampton Village’s business district, which houses a Tracy Anderson fitness studio, has come on the market. 30 Park Place, a 2,800-square-foot, two-story building, has been listed for $3.5 million with Hal Zwick and Jeff Sztorc of Compass Commercial. There are 15-foot ceilings, a half bath, and a commercial elevator. Zoned for retail, exercise or office use, and said to be in excellent condition, the building is on 0.04 of an acre.

In the Face of the Wind
A fascinating historic estate has just come on the market on Shelter Island. “Kemah” (a Shinnecock word meaning “in the face of the wind,” because of the estate’s pleasant southwest breezes), one of the few remaining historic Shelter Island estates, has been listed for sale for $14.995 million by Penelope Moore at Saunders & Associates. The pre-Revolutionary War, wood shingled colonial was built circa 1750. Spanning two waterfront lots, the property includes 17.35 elevated acres with 385 feet on Great Fresh Pond to the north side, and over 5.6 acres of meadow with 596 feet on Peconic Bay looking south to Bridgehampton. This property was vital to the Native Americans who accessed fresh drinking water on Fresh Pond. They constructed a large berm, which exists today, using stone and wooden tools to protect the fresh water from saltwater intrusion. It is one of the houses built by George Havens, who in 1698 bought one thousand acres of the island, which included where the property is located, from Nathanial Sylvester II whose father claimed ownership of Shelter Island. Many original features remain intact today: wood shingles, a two-story barn built in 1886, a hand-stacked fieldstone garage built in 1918, a water tower, chicken coop, a central chimney of bricks brought from Holland originally as a ship’s ballast, and exposed beams. The beams were cut and seasoned in salt water for one year prior to being dried, cut, and carved with Roman numerals for construction and possible future dismantling and rebuilding elsewhere. Remember, moving houses were not at all uncommon for our East End ancestors.

Unordinary Ornare
A new high-end furniture boutique has opened at 98-100 Main Street Southampton. Ornare, a Brazilian brand of high-end custom furniture, is celebrating its sixth American showroom. Inside the showroom, you’ll see iconic pieces such as the metal shelves of the Ikigai line, closets of the Shaker line and the Paris kitchen, amongst others. Fixtures such as slatted panels, cupboards and kitchens are interpreted as elements that create interconnected spaces, mixing high-tech with raw materials. Mix and match panels, support profiles, furniture and shelves in a wide range of materials, colors and finishes.