In Saint-Barthélemy, an American businessman acquired the exceptional villa that the powerful banker David Rockefeller had built at the end of the 1950s, on a huge estate on the island of the French West Indies, we learned from the buyer’s real estate advisor.
“The sale was formalized on April 7,” said in a press release this adviser, Douglas Foregger, president of Wimco Real Estate in Saint-Barthélemy.
The property acquired in 1957 by David Rockefeller, grandson of the founder of the industrial dynasty John D. Rockefeller, was bought by Adam Sinn, a 45-year-old United States national, for “approximately 136 million dollars” (124 million euros), says the American daily The Wall Street Journal, citing “a source close to the transaction”. “This is the highest real estate transaction ever recorded on the island for a single residence,” commented to AFP Christian Wattiau, president of one of the main real estate agencies in Saint-Barthélemy, Sibarth Real. Estate.
This sale represents a great operation for the Territorial Collectivity of Saint-Barthélemy which will collect 5% of the amount, within the framework of the territorial legislation of the registration fees of the transaction, i.e. “a little more than 6 million euros” , told AFP its president Xavier Lédée. The property, the largest on the island according to the management of the territory, extends over nearly 52 hectares in the district of Colombier (North-West). David Rockefeller (who died aged 101 in 2017) called on architect Nelson W. Aldrich to design this villa, which was completed in the early 1960s.
The property was first bought in the early 1990s by Steve and Linda Horn, producers of television commercials in the United States. But they had been looking for a buyer since the severe damage caused to the villa by Hurricane Irma in 2017, says Douglas Foregger. In the press release published by Douglas Foregger, the new owner said he was “delighted to have acquired such an iconic piece of history”. Adam Sinn assures that “at the moment, there are no plans other than the desire to restore the property to its glory of the Rockefeller years”, according to the press release.
Since the vote on new local regulations in December 2020, “the property is located in a natural area. If some arrangements are possible, they are only on minimal surfaces. Precisely so that nothing is done, ”explained to AFP the director of the Territorial Agency for the Environment of Saint-Barth, Sébastien Gréaux.
