Donald Trump has bought Patricia Kluge’s former mansion, the Washington Post reports, for just $6.5M. The 23,000 square foot Albemarle House was put on the market by Kluge in 2009 for a laughable $100M, which surely makes the $6.5M hurt all the more. She got the house as a part of her divorce settlement with John Kluge. Trump had already purchased all of the land around the house itself, including the lawn and the driveway, then made the place look like hell, all to make it impossible for Bank of America to sell the foreclosed mansion. They wanted $16M, he offered $3.6M, and this is where they wound up a little over a year later.
What’s Trump going to do with it? Maybe a golf course, maybe an inn, or maybe just waiting for the market to recover and selling it all for a tidy profit.
Bravo to “formercvilleresident,” who wrote in 2009:
While I don’t like Trump for many, many reasons (Birther in Chief comes to mind) this is a very smart deal for him. Of course owning all the land around the house made him the only real buyer. 6.5 million is a lot for a house but from what little I know about this house it seems very unlikely you could rebuild it for anywhere near this 6.5 million amount. What ever he does will increase traffic and tax revenues for this area of town. I can just hear him say “being so close to Monticello makes this new Trump resort a place where Thomas Jefferson would have loved to hang out. Tom was, like myself, one classy guy- he also had quite an eye for the ladies”
It does make you wonder with Trump and the owner of the Greenbriar buying “huge tracts of land” (cue the Monty Python and the Holy Grail jokes) south of town and so very close to Monticello concerns me what these two have in mind for this area. I will wager that conservation easements are probably not what they are planning.
If he were to turn this into a hotel/golf club/resort, the roads leading to and surrounding the property would need to be significantly improved. The roads aren’t capable of handling much traffic at all.
Who pissed away more money…Mrs. Kluge, or Halsey Minor…My bet’s on Halsey….
NBC 29 says he bought the house & 3,000 acres for the $6.5M.
http://www.nbc29.com/story/19657310/trump-buys-kluges-former-estate-va-for-65m
If he were to turn this into a hotel/golf club/resort…
…there’s gonna be hell toupé.
The NBC29 story is incorrect. Trump already purchased the large amount of acreage comprised of the vineyards and winery. That acreage wasn’t part of the sale mentioned above.
As someone who spent time there, I have some strong feelings about this. However, they are personal and subjective, and difficult to put into words, so I’ll leave it at that.
This story confirms for me a few things:
1) Bank of America is not only a nefarious institution, but it’s a stupid one at that.
2) Critical mass fortunes like Trump play on a different Field of Opportunities than the rest of us. I’m sure plenty of people are okay with that – but I’m not.
At least Minor made his money before toasting it.
Confirmation of one’s own biases more like it. If a sheister offers you half the value of your property you negotiate. Nefarious? Please elaborate.
I’d suggest an extremely expensive executive business retreat. The Vineyard has a helipad, which he already uses for his helicopter when his executives come down for periodic on site check ins, it would not be too difficult to set up something similar for a retreat facility (avoiding surface traffic). The mansion is Edwardian style, staff it like an English Manor home and go to town raking in the cash. He has purchased everything so cheaply any thing he does is going to be pure profit.