Even as the gulf between the haves and have-nots grows, and Occupy Wall Street protesters chant and march, the titans of industry continue to buy and sell ever fancier digs. That leaves the 99 percent of us — mere mortals with smaller paychecks — to gawk at the sumptuous homes owned by finance tycoons and corporate chiefs.
With the help of Zillow.com and Trulia.com, we tracked 10 business moguls with homes they’re trying to sell and others they’ve recently bought. Some are dropping their stellar asking prices; many have moved on before selling. Others, on the brink of losing membership in the exclusive 1 percent club, had no choice but to sell.
In January 2010, shortly after Kenneth D. Lewis retired as Bank of America CEO, the financier listed his four-bedroom, five-bath French provincial-style mansion in Charlotte, N.C., for $4.5 million. Nearly two years later, the 7,000-square-foot home on 1.27 acres of a gated community is still languishing on the market, currently priced at $3.895 million.
Forbes.com slideshow: Business mogul mansions for sale
Former New Jersey governor Jon Corzine, the Wall Street darling turned poster boy for Occupy Wall Street’s cries against financial malfeasance, resigned in October as chairman and chief executive of MF Global Holdings. This, after his $6.3 billion gamble on European debt flopped, $633 million in customer money went missing and the New York-based futures brokerage fell into bankruptcy. Now the price on Corzine’s undeveloped 2,379-acre ranch 14 miles west of the ski resort town of Telluride, Colo., has dropped from $37.5 million to $29 million. When the former chief of Goldman Sachs bought the spread in 1996, he intended someday to build a home and develop the property, said T.D. Smith, the listing broker. Instead, he put it on the market for $40 million in 2007.
“It’s a beautiful mountain ranch,” Smith said of the expansive property with a sweeping view of the 14,000-foot peaks and protected on two sides by dramatically steep cliffs that fall into two river canyons. Interest is stirring. “The price hasn’t been adjusted until recently. It was always priced a bit above the market,” said Smith.
Not long after Ursula Burns moved up the ladder to become chairman and chief executive of Xerox, she sold her three-bedroom Manhattan apartment at the Beekman Regent on East 51st Street. In its place she bought a nine-room, 3,326 square foot penthouse — double the size — for $8.15 million in the Robert A.M. Stern-designed Brompton Condominium on East 85th Street.
“She wanted something a little more grand,” said Michael Spodek, the selling agent and a senior vice president and associate broker with the Corcoran Group. Spodek described the new condominium as “absolutely in turnkey condition” and the layout, “glamorous” with superb sunlight. Burns also owns a home in Connecticut, but her other seven-bedroom home on 1.6 acres in Brighton, N.Y., remains empty and on the market for $879,000.
According to the Nothnagle Realtors listing, the seven-bedroom, seven-bath home on 1.6 acres has a dining room large enough for black-tie galas and is “suitable for captains of industry, who are accustomed to fine living.”
More from Forbes.com
