Monday, 7 January 2013
LOCATION: New York City, NY
PRICE: $4,600,000
SIZE: 2-3 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms
YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Given that soon-to-be imprisoned Peter Madoff worked for and side-by-side with his Ponzi scheming older bother Bernie for 40-plus years it's utterly inconceivable to most people that he didn't—as he has repeatedly insisted—know a thing about his brother's towering house of cards that bilked thousands of people out of billions of dollars until the night big brother confessed his heinous financial transgressions. Somewhat oxymoronically, given his alleged ignorance of his brother's decades long charade, Peter Madoff did confess last fall to one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and one count of falsifying records for which he was sentenced to ten years in the pokey.
While the details about the very well-compensated Peter Madoff's knowledge of and involvement in his brother's super-sized Ponzi scheme will no doubt be investigated—and doubted—for many years to come there is no question he and his missus Marion lived a very luxe life with multi-million dollar residences in ritzy areas of New York City, Long Island and Palm Beach.
The Peter Madoff's sold their Palm Beach spread last year—more on that in a minute—and over the weekend the property gossips at the New York Post revealed the couple unloaded their posh Park Avenue apartment for $4.6 million.
The spacious cooperative spread, located on the sixth floor of a handsome and finely detailed, full-service red brick and limestone edifice originally built in 1929, was purchased by Mister and Missus (Peter) Madoff in June 2004 for $4,100,000. According to listing details and photographs still available online, the two bedroom and 3.5 bathroom apartment was recently renovated to exacting standard in a warmly contemporary fashion with maintenance and common charges that total $4,748 per month.
The clean-lined, loft-like interior spaces include a roomy foyer, a partially paneled "formal" living room with wood-burning fireplace flanked by built in cabinetry and a nearly 30-foot long dining room/family room with more built-in cabinetry and shelving and a built-in wine-cooler. The seven-foot-three inch wide galley kitchen isn't big but it's expensively done in all stainless steel with top-grade appliances that include a washer and dryer. A small adjoining room with windowed bathroom and two wee closets is marked as the "maid's quarters" on the floor plan but it would be—in Your Mama's humble and meaningless opinion—to be downright cruel to make a live-in domestic live in such a cramped—and essentially windowless—room.
A brief corridor off the foyer connects to the guest bedroom—with two closets and windowed restroom—and the corner master suite that's complete with eight closets, four windows and a windowed bathroom with double sinks.
The transaction has not yet been recorded in any of the property record data bases Your Mama consulted—as of today the online listed shows the apartment is still in contract—but according to the Post, the new owner is an as yet unnamed attorney from Chicago.
In May 2001 the Peter Madoffs traded up to a half acre mini-estate just a few short blocks north of the historically high-WASP Palm Beach Bath & Tennis Club and Donald Trump's characteristically ostentatious private club Mar-a-Lago.
Property records show the Peter Madoffs coughed up $3,752,000 for the 5,463 square foot South Florida meets French Regency-style residence that includes five bedrooms, 5.5 bathrooms, a discreet side-facing three car garage and a swimming pool ringed by expensively maintained and punctiliously pruned lawns and gardens.
Your Mama dissed and discussed the fully renovated and upgraded 1970s residence that's set behind a row of assiduously clipped (and somewhat comical) conical hedges in January 2011 when it popped up on the market with a $6.5 million price tag. It only took one price chop to $5,900,000 before the house was sold in May 2011 for $5,500,000. Property records reveal the house is now owned by home fragrance honcho Harry Slatkin and his wife Laura who—as an aside—also own an opulently decorated 1870s Beaux Arts townhouse in New York City.
Old Westbury, not quite 30 miles east of Midtown Manhattan, is an exclusive Long Island enclave long associated with old guard New York society—think E.F. Hutton, the Guests, the Phipps family and a Vanderbilt or two. Pop culturally the semi-rural suburban community is best known as the home of (alleged) mob daughter Victoria Gotti who still owns one of the more garish mansions ever to be erected in that blue-blooded neck of Long Island.
Property records show Mister and Missus Peter Madoff picked up the first portion of their Long Island estate that backs up to the Glen Oaks Club back in March 1988 when they paid $2,000,000 for a genteel, L-shaped center hall Colonial originally built in 1935 on just over two acres. In late 1990 they shelled out another $2,500,000 for the 2.014 acre lot next door.
Their Long Island home waves a much more traditional decorative flag than their other two homes as evidenced in the 30-foot long formal living room just off the foyer (above, top). Listing photographs shows windows dressed with the exact sort of swagged drapery that only old and rich people seem to like, a pair of fringe-skirted sofas pushed against the walls, a picture laden grand piano and a handful of gilt-trimeed oil paintings including one of a dog that's hung over the wood burning fireplace. Very narrow and heavily pedimented French doors flank the fireplace. One set opens into a garden view sunroom (above, middle right) and the other into a dark-paneled library with built-in bookcases, a second fireplace, a hidden wet bar and a deep bay window furnished (above, middle left).
To the other side of the foyer, through an adjoining stair hall, there's a formal dining room (above, bottom left) with another deep bay designed for more smaller and/or more casual lunches and brunches and—nestled into the inside elbow of the L-shaped house— an adjoining butler's pantry where the elevator is somewhat incongruously located. The butler's pantry connects—as it should—into a country-style center island eat in kitchen and breakfast area (above, bottom right) Beyond the kitchen there's a proper laundry room with exterior entrance, an attached two-car garage and back stairs that descend into basement ascend to the guest/family wing on the second floor.
The basement, accessible by both front and back stairs as well as the elevator, includes a nearly 600 square foot entertainment space with fireplace, a bedroom-sized wet bar and a convenient powder pooper. Other ares of the massive basement include rooms for the mechanicals, severals storage rooms and a walk-in wine cellar.
Presumably the proceeds of the sale of the Peter Madoff's house in Old Westbury, like the proceeds from the sale of the Park Avenue apartment, will be controlled by the Feds charged with disbursing any recovered funds to the victims of Bernie's breathtakingly unscrupulous scheme.
exterior photo (New York City): Property Shark
listing photos and floor plan (New York City): Douglas Elliman Real Estate
listing photos (Palm Beach): Sotheby's International Realty
listing photos: (Old Westbury): Daniel Gale / Sotheby's International Realty
