Realty Check

With a Dollop of Hamptons Gossip…

Ka-ching, Martha!

When the news broke in June that Martha Stewart was selling her longtime home on Lily Pond Lane, East Hampton, to Huffington Post and Buzzfeed founder Kenneth Lerer, the value of the trade wasn’t known. The last asking price was reported to be $8.4 million. Turns out the property sold for a whopping $16.5 million, almost twice what people thought and close to ten times what she paid. Stewart paid $1.7 million for the 1873 cottage back in 1991, using the proceeds from her $5 million, five-year consulting contract with Kmart. “I still can’t believe how beautiful it is out here,” she said of East Hampton. But she ended up rarely spending time in the Hamptons, so she decided to downsize. 

Ka-ching, Alan Seligson! 

Another oceanfront East Hampton property, this time on Further Lane, spent less than a month on the market. The estate to come was owned by Alan Seligson, the recently deceased chairman of a company that made aerospace parts. The property was listed with Hedgerow at $52.5 million. It includes four acres of land and approximately 400 linear feet of ocean frontage, along with a 6,100-square-foot cedar-shingled house — which we think is a teardown. Given the crazy market in oceanfront property, the numbers might make sense at this point. We’ll be interested to see what the property finally trades for.

Gimme Shelter!

Corcoran broker Gary DePersia has been especially busy on Shelter Island, having just sold a magnificent 16,000 SF waterfront compound on Coecles Harbor. The last asking price was $11,950,000. Sprawling across 3.25 acres with 325+feet of waterfront, the compound commands vistas over its own private dock to Ram’s Island, Gardiner’s Bay and beyond. DePersia recently listed another Shelter Island waterfront property, the historic Manhanset Estate in Dering Harbor. The nearly three acre estate has rarely traded owners since it was built at the turn of the Century. I’m guessing this one won’t stay on the market very long, given its beauty and history.

East Hampton…the way it used to be

This lovely, dignified old house dates from 1884. It sits on tony Apaquogue Road, close to the ocean. Listed for $14.9 million by Marilyn Clark and Frank Newbold of Sotheby’s International Realty, the house has been in the same family for a hundred years. It’s now in contract and ready to delight a new family.

This building was the first boarding house built in East Hampton, and some of the rooms still have numbers on the doors. Abraham Candy (1801-1880), a teacher and sometime principal at Clinton Academy, was also a farmer. As the extension of the Long Island Railroad to East Hampton in 1867 made a summer visit practical, Candy began accepting summer boarders at his farm on Apaquogue Road. After his death, the farmhouse burnt down; new owners rebuilt and dubbed the building the Apaquogue Hotel. The house was converted to a single-family home after World War I.

Spacious, at about 10,000 square feet, with 12 bedrooms, seven baths, and three fireplaces, the house is the only four-storied house in East Hampton Village. If the new owners are to bulldoze and build new (we hope not), the new place would be allowed to be four stories as well. Happily, the buyer is planning to restore the original house. There are currently no pool or tennis court, but there’s certainly plenty of room to add them.

Welcome back, Miss Weld

Early ‘60s Hollywood teen queen Tuesday Weld, who sold her longtime oceanfront property in Montauk in 2009, apparently misses the town. She’s recently purchased a tiny condo there for $335,000. It was repped by Constance Tighe and John Taylor at Corcoran. Her previous Montauk house, in the Surfside area, traded for $6.75 million. She also has homes in Hollywood and Colorado. The tiny condo Weld bought this summer is in the Montauk Manor. At just 661 square feet, the one-bedroom unit does include two bathrooms, along with two separate entrances. 

One of the Seven Sisters Sells

Also in Montauk, one of the famous and historic Montauk Association homes, the Seven Sisters, designed by McKim, Mead & White, is in contract. The Montauk Association houses are considered important examples of the Shingle Style, a distinctive American architecture and especially associated with summer colonies. These are restrained modest vacation houses, a cohesive group where each house is distinct but where none stand out as being more important than its neighbor. One of them, known as the Andrews House, has been for sale off and on for the past few years and is now finally in contract. Last asking price was $12 million; the property was repped by Chris Coleman of Compass.

Out of this World

The iconic World Pie restaurant on Main Street, Bridgehampton has sold after 22 years in business. Restauranteurs Michael Mannino and his father, Phillip Mannino who purchased the building in 1968, were presented with the off-market deal by Paul Brennan and Martha Gundersen of Douglas Elliman, who handled both sides. The sale price was undisclosed. “Downtown Bridgehampton was a sleepy farming community until Bobby Van began playing the ivories in the building in 1968, also attracting the local literary scene including James Jones, Jack Knowles, Will Morris, Truman Capote. Bobby Van’s later moved across the street to its present location. The village came alive and keeps growing to this day thanks to the Mannino family who owned the building for the past 53 years. We all look forward to the next transformation,” says Gundersen.

Rivers in Southampton

The former Southampton home of proto-Pop artist Larry Rivers has been put on the market. Listed by Michaela Keszler and Paulina Keszler at Douglas Elliman Real Estate, the 1880 house, one of the original homes in the area, retains much of its original charm and period features, including stained glass, carved newel posts, and original doors. The asking price is $8.495 million. 

Rivers (1923-2002) worked as a painter, sculptor, and printmaker and some of his paintings made quite a stir, during the time of Abstract Expressionism, with figurative works. The current owner grew up next door and purchased the house from the artist’s estate in 2003 for $1.2 million. He gut renovated the house, bringing it down to the studs and adding a new kitchen and baths. Out back, Rivers left his signature in cement in his art studio. What is a piece of Hamptons art history worth? Guess we’ll find out.

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