Click here to view the full photogallery. While most listings of this world feature walls that lie perfectly perpendicular to floors, certain architectural marvels take the UFO-like shape of a perfect half-sphere. Often these “dome homes” come with promises of energy efficiency, and nearly all are modestly sized yet manage to make the most of their 360-degree circular views. For example, somewhere between Vegas and L.A. in Newberry Springs, Calif., is this, a home designed by prolific and versatile Southern California architect Harold Bissner, Jr. and completed in 1968. Inspired by the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station nuclear plant in northwestern San Diego county, the property now belongs to local semi-celebrity Huell Howser, who’s hosted a TV travel show for the past two decades. The two-bedroom, two-bathroom main house features a dome formed from concrete and bent-fir beams and grounded by glass walls; inside, a conversation pit keeps things centered around a fireplace. There’s also a one-bedroom guest house, a lake, 60 acres of untarnished land, a three-car carport, a rooftop observation deck on top of that dome. The property has been lingering on the market at its initial $750K ask. Click here to view the full photogallery. ↑ Sited on a hillside on the U.S. Virgin Island of St. Croix, this five-bedroom, four-bathroom, 4,600-square-foot dome home enjoys breathtakingly uninterrupted water views. A nice deviation from the Mediterranean mega-casa, the place is asking $1.7M. Click here to view the full photogallery. ↑ Here now, a 2,400-square-foot, three-bedroom residence in the central-Arizona town of Dewey. Built in 2004, the home is asking $185K (with discounts for cash buyers), and, according to the listing, it’s not only “unusual” but energy efficient, as well. Click here to view the full photogallery. ↑ Nestled in the dense woods of New Paltz in upstate New York, this house, dubbed “Domespace,” is a 2,300-square-foot, three-bedroom escape and the only French kit home of its kind to be constructed in the country. The entire structure, set on a 28-acre lot, rotates at the push of a button and boasts 40-foot ceilings at the peak, a spiral staircase, and eco-friendly bamboo flooring. It’s listed for $1.2M. ↑ Finally, a much smaller sight to behold: a 320-square-foot stucco dome house in dusty Taos, N.M. Constructed from a kit akin to a Tinkertoy set, it’s entirely solar powered and boasts sweeping views of the mountains. Even the brokerbabble manages to emphasize the positives: “Full length double-paned glass doors. Finish interior plaster and exterior stucco to your tastes.” It has, until relatively recently, been asking a meager $74K but it seems to have been delisted. · A Dome Home That Wasn’t Inspired By a Nuclear Plant [Curbed National] · Buy a House at the Very Top of a Volcano For Less Than $1M [Curbed National] · Here, Buy a Dome Home Smack in the Middle of the Desert [Curbed National] · Upstate New York’s Out-of-This-World Spinning Saucer House [Curbed National] · Minuscule Desert Dome Home With a Justly Minuscule Price [Curbed National]
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On the Market: No Right Angles: Otherworldly Dome Homes Here On Earth
Florida’s foreclosure woes are so bad that one in every 360 homes received a foreclosure filing in December; the state boasts nearly 25,000 foreclosed homes, so many, in fact, that bold-faced names such as O.J. Simpson, pro football player Santana Moss, and Burt Reynolds have all faced repossession. Fun times! Despite Florida’s frowny face—and certainly because of the state’s cheap inventory—a new study of about 100M properties conducted by real estate search engine Trulia shows that many people want to move there. Of the 10 metro areas that online house hunters showed the greatest interest in, seven are Floridian, including Palm Bay/Melbourne/Titusville and Cape Coral/Fort Myers. Additionally, out-of-towners show an active interest in Miami—of those scouting the city, one-third came from more than 500 miles away. As Stefanos Chen at AOL Real Estate puts it, “Couple steep discounts with snowbirds’ perennial quest for sunnier, happier places to live, and Florida’s dominance in the report makes perfect sense.” Below, find a chart detailing where demand among online house hunters is strongest. Click to expand! · Out-of-Towners Covet Florida Real Estate, Locals Scratch Heads [AOL Real Estate] · Trulia [official site] · All Foreclosures coverage [Curbed National]
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Market Watch: Lots and Lots of People Want to Move to Florida, Apparently
East Coast restaurant emperor Stephen Starr has his 6,000-square-foot Philly townhouse up for sale for $2.5M. Included: a roof deck, a Zen garden, and a kitchen designed by “opulently function” local architect and designer Joanne Hudson. [Curbed Philly]
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Buy Stephen Starr’s Place: East Coast restaurant emperor Stephen Starr…
Have a nomination for a jaw-dropping listing that would make a mighty fine House of the Day? Get thee to the tipline and send us your suggestions. We’d love to see what you’ve got. Click here to view the full photogallery. Location: Watch Hill, R.I. Price: $8,200,000 The Skinny: When “preppy” and “Rhode Island” are used in the same sentence, it is usually to describe that age-old summer retreat of the wealthy, Newport, but there are other, more low key options that still ascribe to a certain social standard, and a certain price point. Watch Hill, on the coast near the western border with Connecticut is one such enclave, a grassy seaside knoll dotted with classic New England architecture. This 1906 shingle-style estate occupies a half-acre on aptly-named Bluff Avenue, with eight bedrooms and nine baths all tucked under a distinctive gambrel roof. The classic style and ocean views certainly come at a premium though, as, despite the small lot, this summer getaway is priced at $8.2M. · 12 Bluff Ave [Zillow]
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House of the Day: The Quintessential Summer "Cottage" in Preppy R.I. Enclave
Tennis celeb Anna Kournikova has finally sold her Miami Beach mansion for $7.43M. The waterfront manse had been lingering on the market for months for well over $9M and had lots of bells and whistles—but no tennis court. [Miami Herald via The Real Deal ; previously ]
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Celebrity Real Estate: Tennis celeb Anna Kournikova has finally…
New listing photos reveal that a splitso Ryan Reynolds and Scarlett Johansson did their decadent celebrity peers proud by not trashing their Buff & Hensman-designed Wong House for the year and a half that they owned it. In fact, upgrades to the $3.65M listing include solar power and pendant lamps. [Curbed LA]
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Click here to view the full photogallery. Curbed Detroit readers considering a weekend “Up North,” as it’s called, might have a look-see at this listing. The landmark “home of the future,” as the brokerbabble says, was built in 1971 and has three bedrooms over 2,400 square feet; plus, much like its fellow dome homes in far-off places, it’s “energy efficient, practically soundproof and was built to last forever.” And as any good spaceship should, this one’s got boatloads of custom Herman Miller furniture. Ask? $169K. · 285 W Mckinley Rd Traverse City, Mich. [Coldwell Banker Great Lakes]
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On the Market: Have a Look at Michigan’s Utterly Wacky "Home of the Future"
Click here to view the full photogallery. Click to enlarge! Floorplans of the American “Versailles”—which billionaire mega-developer David Siegel and his wife had intended to turn into their dream home but are now forced to sell after suffering blows from the housing and credit crunch—have just surfaced on the real estate blog A.V.D. Mansion. Listed for $100M finished (“based on the royal palace of Louis XIV of the 17th century or to the buyers’ specificiation”) or $75M unfinished (“with all exterior finishings in crates in the 20-car garage on-site”) and spanning 90,000 square feet, the Windermere, Fla., property has recently been made subject of a Sundance film that was picked up for mainstream production. Now, about those floorplans: they’re published on the property’s official site and reveal extravagances such as a nanny’s room and a “children’s theater room.” One question, though: where the heck are those 10 kitchens? · Floor plans to David Siegel’s “Versailles” [A.V.D. Mansions] · Versailles by David Siegel [official site] · Inside the Drama Surrounding the Country’s Largest House [Curbed National]
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Mindblowing: Are These the Floorplans to the Country’s Largest House?
Today Curbed NY visits the ridiculously swanky sales off of One57, a building underway in midtown Manhattan that hosts the city’s priciest listing: a $110M penthouse. The views, simulated on a huge projection screen, are insane, as are the kitchen finishes: one’s all Macassar ebony. [Curbed NY]
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Have a nomination for a jaw-dropping listing that would make a mighty fine House of the Day? Get thee to the tipline and send us your suggestions. We’d love to see what you’ve got. Click here to view the full photogallery. Location: Hermosa Beach, Calif. Price: $5,295,000 The Skinny: The Pritzker Prize-winning starchitect Thom Mayne is in high demand lately. He and his L.A.-based firm, Morphosis, have designed plenty of award-winning buildings across the country, including the jagged New Academic Building at NYC’s Cooper Union. In Hermosa Beach though, this three-bed beach house has been lingering on the market for years, with a price that’s varied wildly, from a high of $7.9M to a low of $3.5M, before settling at $5.3M. A tall, vertical design just steps off the famous beachfront Strand, the metal-clad house enjoys ocean views from the upper levels, 4,000 square feet over four levels, a basketball court out front, two fireplaces, an elevator, a wine cellar. The mercurial nature of the price remains a mystery, but something that’s been featured in both the New York Times and Architectural Digest was always going to end up with a multimillion-dollar price tag. · Hermosa Beach [Zillow]
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House of the Day: Thom Mayne-Designed SoCal Beach House Still Awaits Buyer