Investor tries quick flip on Marin estate with $20M ask

Even with a price tag so low it scared the neighbors, there was only one offer on 27 Upper Road in Ross when it came to market as a neglected, empty, bank-owned compound formerly owned by tech billionaire Eric Greenberg this past spring. Marin-based real estate investor Steve Scarpa bought the 3-acre property for just under its $9 million asking price in May, according to public records.

27 Upper Road in Marin (Jason Wells Photography)

Less than five months later, the nearly 10,000-square-foot house is back on the market with an asking price of $20 million.

“Nothing worked. Everything was shot,” Tracy McLaughlin of The Agency said of the property’s condition when her client put in the only offer on the home this past spring.

27 Upper Road in Marin (Jason Wells Photography)

McLaughln would not confirm the owner but said he is of Italian descent and that despite the deferred maintenance he loved the Tuscan inspiration behind the limestone and stucco main home, which has painted ceilings and other artisan-applied details. The client briefly considered keeping the property, McLaughlin said, but he “already owns one of the nicer properties in Ross” and decided to flip the home instead.

27 Upper Road in Marin (Jason Wells Photography)

The real estate investor owns a construction company and was able to pull workers off other jobs to quickly complete extensive remodels to the home’s systems, McLaughlin said, including a house-wide air fragrance dispenser that puffs out a choice of aromas. He also took on cosmetic work, such as the renovated kitchen, refinished white oak herringbone floors and upgraded light fixtures, and put in a new driveway at the 1,000-square-foot stone guest house.

She did not know what he spent on the project, but said buyers were getting a bargain at $2,000 per square foot. “You could never get a house like this at this price if it were built today,” she said, adding that some homes in Ross go for upwards of $3,000 a square foot.

27 Upper Road in Marin (Jason Wells Photography)

Originally built in 1992 by Mitch Wiener, a custom home contractor who McLaughlin described as a “builder to the stars,” it was used as his personal residence until repeat tech founder Greenberg paid $17 million for it in 1999, setting a record for the highest-priced property in both Marin and San Francisco that year.

McLaughlin, who said she is friends with Greenberg, added that he spent $3 million adding one of the largest wine cellars in a private residence in the state under the home, with room for about 27,000 bottles. At the time, he wasn’t thinking about resale, she said, and thought he would be living in the home long term.

Greenberg became a billionaire a few months before the purchase when Viant and Scient, the web consulting companies he co-founded in the mid-1990s, went public. But he lost a significant amount of wealth with the dot-com crash and in 2016 he listed his 3-acre Ross estate at almost $23 million. When the seven-bedroom, 8.5-bath home failed to sell at that price, it came back to market in 2017 and 2018 with a nearly $19 million ask. In October 2019, Greenberg went into default on the property and in January 2022, Citibank assumed control at a value of just over $7 million, according to public records.

With the new improvements, and a focus on “more mature” high-net-worth wine enthusiasts who would be able to fill the cellar, McLaughlin is confident there’s a “special buyer” willing to pay about what the property went for more than 20 years ago.

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