One of the Bay Area's most lavish properties is for sale – for $35 million, despite being built for more than $100 million dollars.
J. Taylor Crandall's Alamo estate, Fieldhaven, is back on the market, just three years after the private equity founder bought it for just $19 million.
Tech billionaire and Workday co-founder David Duffield spent three and a half years and $135 million building the nearly 22,000-square-foot facility.
If modified inflationThe property would cost approximately $250 million to build today.
J. Taylor Crandall's Alamo estate, Fieldhaven, is back on the real estate market again, just three years after the private equity founder bought it for just $19 million
The estate also has an aviary/bird sanctuary, a dog park and a tree house with windows and finishes 'as beautiful as most houses'
The mansion has ten bedrooms and 22 bathrooms
The mansion features ten bedrooms, 22 bathrooms and a 1,115-square-foot detached guest house with two bedrooms, two en suite bedrooms, a full kitchen and a fireplace.
Located just 30 miles from San Francisco, the main building features stone walls, reclaimed wood beams, a slate roof, a library and two offices, one with a terrace.
The estate too has an aviary/bird sanctuary, a dog park and a tree house with windows and finishes 'as nice as most houses'.
Marilee Headen of Compass, who is listing the estate together with Taso Tsakos of Engel & Völkers, said SFGATE that the spacious garage, which can accommodate twenty cars, was “designed to resemble an old-fashioned barn.”
Crandall explained that the views of Mount Diablo from the property and the quality of the home's finishes convinced him to buy and spend the money.
Located just 30 miles from San Francisco, the main building features stone walls, reclaimed wood beams, a slate roof, a library and two offices, one with a terrace.
The main house has multiple antique French limestone fireplaces throughout and a custom mural has been installed in the home theater
There is also a detached 1,115-square-foot guest house with two bedrooms, two en suite bedrooms, a full kitchen and a fireplace.
Other luxurious amenities include a dramatic formal dining room, a living room with a bar, a wine cellar with a custom-designed iron door and tasting room, and opulent marble soaking tubs in the bathrooms.
The main house has multiple antique French limestone fireplaces throughout and a custom mural has been installed in the home theater.
The extractor hood is hand-painted and has brick inlay and wooden finishes, providing access to a sunny terrace.
Other luxurious amenities include a dramatic formal dining room, a living room with a bar, a wine cellar with a custom-designed iron door and tasting room, and opulent marble soaking tubs in the bathrooms.
Outside the main house, the estate has two swimming pools, one with a water slide (plus a cold plunge pool and hot tub) and a generous patio with a fully equipped outdoor kitchen.
After purchasing the property, the Crandalls spent several million dollars adding a Crestron system and a solar field.
The extractor hood is hand-painted and has brick inlay and wooden finishes, providing access to a sunny terrace
Marilee Headen of Compass, who is listing the estate with Taso Tsakos of Engel & Völkers, told SFGATE that the spacious garage, which can accommodate 20 cars, was “designed to resemble an old-fashioned barn.”
Outside the main house, the estate has two swimming pools, one with a water slide (plus a cold plunge pool and hot tub) and a generous patio with a fully equipped outdoor kitchen
The outdoor kitchen has wooden beams and finishes, stone walls and marble tops
After purchasing the property, the Crandalls spent several million dollars adding a Crestron system and a solar field
Although the family felt at home on the Fieldhaven estate, they decided to sell the property and move to a house in nearby Diablo to be closer to their children's schools and activities.
The couple purchased their Diablo home for approximately $6 million, around the same time they purchased the Alamo estate. and have five other homes in other states, including Utah and Massachusetts.
According to real estate brokerage Redfin, the average sales price in Alamo was $2.3 million in October, down 8.8 percent compared to October 2022.
Their move comes after a children's book author and her husband decided to sell their remote home in Tennessee and move back to California.
Stephanie Campisi, 38, and Wesley, 45, had bought a three-bedroom, three-story home for about $250,000 in eastern Tennessee during the pandemic, but decided to move back to California this year.
Stephanie Campisi, her husband Wesley and their young son headed to remote Tennessee during the Covid-19 pandemic, but have since returned to California
The couple bought a three-bedroom, three-story home for about $250,000 in eastern Tennessee, halfway between Knoxville and Chattanooga.
Three percent of all homes sold in the U.S. between May and July sold for less than what the owners bought them for, Redfin data shows
The couple explained that they struggled with the remoteness of the area.
'If we wanted to go to a zoo, a children's museum or a bookstore, it would be a whole day trip. We had to travel an hour to get to a medical specialist, while here everything is a twenty-minute drive, so that makes a big difference,” she says.
'It affected our daily lives because we like to have access to things in the city. Our four-year-old son is also going to school next year, so that also played a role.'
There was also a huge growth in the number of people moving to Knoxville and Chattanooga at the time, Stephanie said, which meant residents were being pushed out of the cities and into smaller nearby towns.
“We saw a lot of movement and a lot of growth, but not necessarily the infrastructure to support it, so that was a big challenge for us,” she said.
The couple bought their 2,500-square-foot estate sight unseen and sold it earlier this year.
“There was a point where we decided we had to wait two years before we could sell it and not realize the added value,” she said.
“We put the house up for sale in April and it took several months to sell, just like when the market fell and interest rates rose.
“Property values had skyrocketed, so we sold it for 70 percent more than we bought it for. But now that we're back here, prices in California have also gone up, so we didn't walk away with a big amount of money.”