Florida House Hits Market For $195 Million

The average price for a house in Manalapan, Florida, is $255,000. It’s pretty safe to say that a house selling for $195 million is not an average house. In fact, it may have raised the average quite a bit.

The pricey property even has a name: Gemini. According to a listing at realtor.com, the property is a roughly 15.65-acre tropical compound with about 1,200 feet of Atlantic Ocean coastline and about 1,300 feet of frontage on the Intercoastal Waterway.

The property covers 65,873 square feet, has 33 bedrooms, 34 full bathrooms, and 13 half bathrooms. A cabana, pool and spa, and tennis court are also part of the deal.

Here are highlights from the listing:

[A] once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to acquire one of the world’s truly great estates, giving rare total privacy on Manalapan’s prestigious barrier island, just south of Palm Beach. Cloaked in a breathtaking world-class botanical garden oasis, this unparalleled island-like paradise uniquely and seamlessly joins two sublime old Florida settings-one on the dune-dash fringed ocean beachfront, the other on the bay-like Intracoastal with dock and pier-through to passage ways on the grounds and an irreproducible gallery passageway within the residence.

Once the winter retreat of Lowell and Gloria Guinness, the original home was designed by architect Marion Sims Wyeth and built in the 1940 s for the Lambert Pharmaceutical family. The painstaking total transformation of the property completed in 2002 included the reconstruction of the residence in a design by noted Palm Beach Architect Edson E. Dailey, created a home as exquisite as it is well-engineered. Designed for both large-scale entertaining and comfortable everyday living, the interiors of the elegant yet inviting residence have a warm tropical wood motif which blends with natural finishes.

Bringing in the beauty of the outdoors, many rooms open to lushly secluded ocean side loggias, while others lead to the spellbinding grotto-like pool terrace and orchid loggia. Also privately placed among the exotic gardens of the walled and gated compound are 2 luxurious cottages, another exquisite 3 story residence, the manager’s house, and manager’s offices.

For recreation enjoyment, the grounds include a PGA standard golf practice area and extensive sports complex.