Richard Gere Heads
To The Hamptons
by Troy McMullen
From The Wall Street Journal Online
October 10, 2005
Actor Richard Gere should have no problem commuting to this month's Hamptons International Film Festival, on Long Island, where his new movie, "Bee Season," kicks off the event. The star has agreed to buy a house in the Hamptons village of North Haven for close to its $7.9 million asking price, according to people familiar with the deal. Mr. Gere declined to comment.
The 2½-story house sits on just over four acres with eight bedrooms and three baths and 300 feet of Shelter Island Sound waterfront. Actor Robert Edeson built the house in 1904 and named it Strong Heart, after a character he once played on Broadway. Since the 1950s, Warren and Florence Haring have owned the property. Fellow villagers include singer Jimmy Buffett and actress Julie Andrews. Carl Marino and Sandy Morell of Century 21 in Agawam, N.Y., share the listing. Mr. Gere, 56 years old, already owns a house in nearby Water Mill, which he bought with his wife, Carey Lowell, in 2001 for $2.7 million, property records show.
Though Manhattan's real-estate market has showed some recent signs of cooling -- some surveys showed prices falling in the third quarter from the second -- data about the Hamptons market so far haven't shown similar weakness. In the first eight months of 2005, the median price for a single-family home in Southampton was $1.6 million, compared with $945,000 for all of 2004, according to the Suffolk Research Service and Corcoran Group's Diane Saatchi.
Reggie Jackson's Vegas
Former New York Yankees slugger Reggie Jackson bought an apartment at Icon Las Vegas, a new condominium complex under construction a block away from the Strip. The 59-year-old Mr. Jackson, who played in 27 World Series games, bought a three-bedroom unit, according to the developer. The purchase price couldn't be learned, but apartments of that size list on the development's Web site for $800,000. Mr. Jackson declined to comment.
The athlete, whose last full season as a player was 1986 and who was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1993, works as a senior special adviser to the New York Yankees, according to a Jackson spokesman, Matt Merola, who says the sports star's main home is in Carmel, Calif. The two-tower Las Vegas condo complex, being developed by Related Group of Florida, will have 514 units selling for $600,000 to more than $1 million. Amenities will include valet, wine cave, billiard room and a cinema for private showings.
The Las Vegas condo field is crowded, with about 40,000 to 50,000 units in the planning stages, according to Dennis Smith, president of Home Builders Research Inc. Donald Trump, actor George Clooney, and Hard Rock Cafe co-founder Peter Morton are backing developments.
Capital Appreciation
A 16-acre tract of Washington, D.C., land that art collector and philanthropist Duncan Phillips, founder of the Phillips Collection, once called home sold for $21.2 million. That's among the highest prices paid for a property in the city, local brokers say. A company owned by former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, who was assassinated earlier this year, sold the property to a trust, public records show. The new owners plan to build 46 homes on the land, according to their broker. Mr. Phillips and his family had a 38-room mansion built on the property just west of Georgetown in the 1920s. Duncan Phillips died in 1966; an heir sold the property to Mr. Hariri's company in 1987, and the mansion was demolished about a year later. Cathie Gill, of Cathie Gill Realtors, handled the transaction.
Fruits of Labor
Longtime New York City labor lawyer Theodore Kheel -- he also consulted for New York mayors and President Lyndon B. Johnson on labor disputes -- has put his Riverdale, N.Y., home on the market for $5 million. Built in 1901, the Tudor and Greek revival sits on a half acre with eight bedrooms, seven bathrooms, a balcony and four fireplaces. It's about 10 miles north of midtown Manhattan. At age 92, Mr. Kheel is still practicing law; clients have included artist Christo. Eugenia Foxworth, of Coldwell Banker Hunt Kennedy, has the listing.
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