Art collector couple buys Palazzo del Mare unit for $8.4M

Art collectors Sam Rose and Julia Walters paid nearly $1,700 psf for their Fisher Island unit

7111 Fisher Island Drive. Inset: Elena Bluntzer (Photo credit: Lenny Kagan, SupremeScene.com)
7111 Fisher Island Drive. Inset: Elena Bluntzer (Photo credit: Lenny Kagan, SupremeScene.com)

Modern art collectors Sam Rose and Julie Walters just picked up an oceanfront unit at Palazzo del Mare on Fisher Island for $8.4 million, property records show.

The husband and wife duo paid about $1,666 per square foot for the 5,041-square-foot unit on the ground floor of the luxury condo building at 7193 Fisher Island Drive. Records show Bent and Perd Company, led by Fiorella De Satory and Francisco Perez Diaz, sold the condo. The company paid $7.2 million for unit 7111 in 2008.

This latest sale marks the highest resale on Fisher Island so far this year, according to listing agent Elena Bluntzer of One Sotheby’s International Realty. It hit the market last year for $10.8 million and was reduced to $8.7 million. The unit sold for a 22 percent discount off the original asking price.

“It was not going to sell without a price adjustment,” Bluntzer told The Real Deal, referring to the stagnant market. In May, a ninth-floor unit at Palazzo del Mare was reduced from $22 million to $17.5 million.

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The buyers are well known in the art community. In 2004, Rose was elected as vice chair for the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Last year, the museum featured their collection in an exhibition that explored American and European modern art.

Their four-bedroom, five-and-a-half bathroom residence comes with a 4,000-square-foot terrace. Features include a three-car garage, high ceilings, grey limestone floors, a library, and a poolside cabana with ocean views.

Palazzo del Mare, built in 2007, is one of the newer luxury condos to be developed on the island. Last year, PDS Development completed Palazzo del Sol, a 10-story, 43-unit luxury condo building. The largest penthouse recently sold for $31.26 million.

The island, reached only by ferry or helicopter, features such amenities as two marinas, 18 tennis courts, a golf course, eight dining establishments and a mile-long private beach. Membership to the Fisher Island Club, required with a condo purchase, is $250,000 for an equity membership with fees of $2,000 per month. Fisher Island’s common areas also recently underwent $60 million in renovations.

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