Waterfront access alone can cost you many millions of dollars. Tack on a ritzy zip code, a few extra acres of land and a host of luxurious finishes and amenities, and your house could be among the most expensive homes in the South.
For the second installment in our series on the most expensive homes on the market in the United States, we turned our attention to the region below the Mason-Dixon line. (We've already ranked the ten priciest in the country, and the most expensive in the Northeast.) Once again, the sunshine state dominated the list. In fact, nine of the ten homes on our list lay within Florida’s borders. (The remaining home, ranked third with its $35 million listing price, rests on 54 acres in Denton, Texas.)
"It’s not surprising to me," says Jim McCann of The Corcoran Group, whose $45 million Palm Beach listing comes in second on our list. "A lot of the aging baby boom population wants to come to a warm climate. Florida is a high growth area and there’s no state income tax.
"Because there are only so many A-plus waterfront locations available, the price pressure on these high-end properties continues to go up," he explains.
Florida--specifically, Palm Beach--holds the record for the most expensive home sale in the United States. In 2004, Ronald O. Perelman, the billionaire who controls Revlon and other brands, sold his oceanfront estate for $70 million.
Today, this exclusive island is home to the highest-priced property in the country. A French Regency-style estate owned by Donald Trump is on the market for $125 million, the highest ever asking price for a U.S. private residence. (Click here to see our video tour.) What's more, it is more than triple what the real estate mogul paid for it in 2004, when he purchased it from former health care mogul Abe Gosman at bankruptcy auction."
In this case, the $125 million price tag, which incidentally is $85 million more than the next most expensive home on our South list, buys several acres of land, 475 feet of waterfront, an 18-bedroom mansion, pool house, guest house and carriage house.
But jaw-dropping sales prices are not exclusive to Trump’s pricey palace. Real estate has become more costly throughout Florida. The median price for an existing home increased 13% statewide from April 2005 to April 2006, and shot up 96% from five years ago, according to the Florida Association of Realtors. In Palm Beach County specifically, the median price for existing homes went up 4% from this year to last–but the prices were already so high, they didn't have much room to climb.
"A quarter of an acre of dirt [in Palm Beach] starts at about $2 million," says Carol Digges, a broker associate at Brown Harris Stevens in Palm Beach.
With price tags like these, it is little surprise that these high profile homes have high profile owners. Among them are Julio Iglesias, whose $28 million Indian Creek Island mansion places seventh on our list, and Hulk Hogan, who owns a $25 million Belleair estate ranked eighth.
So while the lowest price of a home on our list has dropped slightly, from $25.5 million in 2005 to $24.9 million this year, the average price of a home on our list is $34.9 million this year, up 7% from 2005. Things aren't exactly headed South.
