Manhattan Townhouse Fetches $79.5 Million, Setting Price Record

(Bloomberg) -- A home on Manhattan's Upper East Side sold for $79.5 million, according to property records made public Wednesday, making it the highest price ever paid for a townhouse in the borough.

The 20,500-square-foot (1,905-square-meter) property, at 19 E. 64th St., had been owned by the Wildenstein family, billionaire art dealers whose gallery was located at the site for more than 80 years. The previous record for a Manhattan townhouse was the $53 million paid for 4 E. 75th St., in 2006, according to appraiser Miller Samuel Inc.

In 2014, the Wildenstein family signed a deal to sell its limestone-clad building to the government of Qatar for use as a consulate. But Qatar pulled out of the sale the day before the closing, and the family relisted the property for $100 million.

The building has three stories, accessible by elevator, and 20-foot (6.1-meter) ceilings, according to a description in a lawsuit brought by another would-be buyer. The plaintiff in that suit, Len Blavatnik's Access Industries LLC, accused the Wildensteins of reneging on a verbal agreement to sell it the townhouse for $79 million after the Qatar deal fell through.

The broker marketing the property for the sellers was Carrie Chiang of Corcoran Group. The buyer is a limited-liability corporation called 19-21 East 64 Holding LLC, according to the property records.

To contact the reporter on this story: Oshrat Carmiel in New York at ocarmiel1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Daniel Taub at dtaub@bloomberg.net, Josh Friedman