Palm Beach house asks $13 million, sells for $6.5 million and raises some eyebrows

How do you explain the price difference when a Palm Beach house sells for a recorded $6.5 million after being listed for sale at nearly $13 million?

And asking price aside, the just-closed sale price of the house at 255 Ridgeview Drive recorded at $5 million less than the amount the sellers paid for the home a little more than two years ago.

A single phrase might address those steep discounts: “extenuating circumstances.”

In any case, the eyebrow-raising sale price for the North End house appears to be a one-off, even in a market that has seen its share of price reductions over the past year.

A company controlled by developer and real estate investor Todd Michael Glaser of Palm Beach and Miami Beach bought the four-bedroom house, which was built in 2004 but recently renovated.

Glaser wouldn’t discuss specifics of the sale or what led to the sale price. But he did say he and his decorator wife, Kim, would furnish and relist the house during the upcoming season.

Glaser chose his words carefully when asked about the sale by the Palm Beach Daily News.

“Opportunities arise when you’re ready to act and you take advantage of it,” Glaser said. “It happens in the (luxury) car market, the watch market, the art market.”

Broker Christian Angle of Christian Angle Real Estate , who handled both sides of the sale, couldn’t be reached for comment.

On the sellers’ side were Mary Elizabeth Porter and her ex-husband, Michael Porter, according to the deed recorded Aug. 8 by the Palm Beach County Clerk ’s office.

They were married, however, when they bought the house in June 2022 for a recorded $11.5 million , or $1 million over its asking price, according to records in the multiple listing service. With ties to Texas, they owned the house individually and as trustees of trusts in their names. Each had a 50% ownership interest.

Last summer, Mary Porter filed for a divorce, which was granted in September, according to Texas court records filed with the Gillespie County Clerk’s office.

Mary Porter is a daughter of the late Virginia media mogul Frank Batten Sr., who founded The Weather Channel and sold it in 2008 — the year before his death — for a reported $3.5 billion.

The deed for the Porters’ 2022 purchase on Ridgeview Drive listed their address as Cross Creek Ranch, their 1,500-acre ranch in Doss, Texas, an unincorporated Hill Country community in Gillespie County, about 100 miles northwest of Austin. Although the ranch has cattle and farming operations, it also offers hunting and “sportsmanship activities,” according to its website.

While they were married, the couple became well known in Texan conservative political circles when they made two $1 million donations — one in 2017 and the other in 2019 — to Republican Gov. Greg Abbot’s ultimately successful re-election campaign. The donations reportedly were among the largest of the gubernatorial election cycle.

After the first of those donations, Michael Porter told the Austin American-Statesman he and his wife were “very, very, very private people.”

In 2022, the couple founded a political action committee, Texans for Responsible Government, to support Republican candidates. The PAC was jumpstarted with a $1 million donation made by Michael Porter, according to published reports.

Mary Porter and Michael Porter couldn’t be reached for comment.

The house on Ridgeview Drive had been listed for sale since June 2023, but the sale likely came together within a couple of weeks of the closing, according to people familiar with the transaction. The sale closed Aug. 5, the MLS shows.

The deed recording the sale lists the address of the trusts that sold the house as a condominium Mary Porter owns through her trust in Charleston, South Carolina.

Angle had originally listed the Palm Bech house at $13.9 million but reduced the price to $12.95 million in March.

The house has 4,143 square feet of living space, inside and out. The bulk of the residence is tucked behind the two-car garage and a hedge-bordered front yard with a swimming pool. The house stands on a quarter-acre lot a couple of blocks south of the Palm Beach Country Club.

The sales description described the house as “stunning, light and bright” with an open-floor layout that includes an eat-in kitchen, dining area and living room. The main bedroom suite has bay windows and two walk-in closets.

The house was renovated for resale by previous owners, who sold it in 2021 to Douglas Leon Williams and his wife, Gabrielle Jean Sirchio for its asking price of $5.35 million . They, in turn, sold it to the Porters, who were represented in that deal by Angle, with agent Gary Pohrer of Douglas Elliman Real Estate acting on behalf of Williams and Sirchio.

Palm Beach Board of Realtors President John Pinson, who wasn’t involved with the recent deal on Ridgeview Drive, acknowledged that some real estate transactions aren’t as cut-and-dried as they might appear on paper.

“There can be extenuating circumstances. There’s more to an offer than the price,” he said. “And sometimes, when there’s cash on the barrel, the sale is quick.”

He added: “It pays to make offers. The worst thing a seller can say is ‘no.’”

The amount paid in the Ridgeview Drive sale almost certainly will prove to be simply a blip on the overall real estate scene, said Corcoran Group agent Dana Koch, who wasn’t involved in the transaction.

“One sale,” Koch said, “does not make a market.”

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Darrell Hofheinz is a USA TODAY Network of Florida journalist who writes about Palm Beach real estate in his weekly “Beyond the Hedges” column. He welcomes tips about real estate news on the island. Email dhofheinz@pbdailynews.com, call 561-820-3831 or tweet @PBDN_Hofheinz. Subscribe today to support our journalism.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Palm Beach house asks $13 million, sells for $6.5 million and raises some eyebrows