Marrakech Hotel, favored by celebrities, on market
Palais Rhoul - a family-owned boutique hotel in Marrakech, Morocco, whose list of past guests includes George Clooney and David Beckham - has gone on the market for 25 million euros (about $32 million).
A buyer could return the hotel to the private residence it was 12 years ago, the listing agent says. The Rhoul family, Parisian restaurateurs, built themselves a Greco-Roman style private residence in Palmeraie, a palm tree-filled neighborhood on the outskirts of Marrakech.
Twelve years ago, they expanded the 12-acre property into a hotel with 20 individually designed suites, two restaurants, an English-style garden with silk tents and a spa offering traditional steam-bath hammam.
Decor includes vintage furniture from Hong Kong and antique books from the family's private collection, says co-owner Fanny Rhoul. Xavier Attal of Immo Best International in Paris has the listing.
Price cut on supermansion
The era when supermansion owners refused to cut prices may be over. Recently, outside San Francisco, mining executive Robert Friedland trimmed the price of his restored 1895 mansion by 26 percent to $48 million after the house had spent four years on the market for $65 million.
In 1995, Friedland paid $5.5 million for the 12,000-square-foot house on Belvedere Island and has said he spent nine years and $32 million renovating the one-acre property, set on a crest with sweeping views of San Francisco. It's known as Locksley Hall.
Listing agent Olivia Hsu Decker of Decker Bullock Sotheby's International Realty said a tentative $65 million contract with an investment group fell through in the spring as real-estate values plummeted. Friedland is the founder and owner of Vancouver, British Columbia-based Ivanhoe Mines, whose interests include copper, gold and iron ore.
Chris Whittle's guesthouse
Chris Whittle, founder of school-management company Edison Schools, has listed part of his 11-acre waterfront Hamptons estate for $27 million. Six years ago, Whittle tried to sell the entire estate, which is in East Hampton, N.Y., for $45 million, then $36 million, but eventually took it off the market.
Whittle, who's based in Knoxville, Tenn., is offering a 3.7-acre property including a four-bedroom, four-bath guesthouse, designed in 1990 by architect Peter Marino in a shingle style. The high price is partly due to its 400 feet on Georgica Pond. Neighbors include Steven Spielberg. Peter Turino of Brown Harris Stevens, an affiliate of Christie's Great Estates, has the listing. Whittle is no longer affiliated with Edison.