TedKoppel

From the Real Estalker:
--Pete Sampras and his wife Bridgette cut the price on their Beverly Hills mansion from $25 million to $23 million. It seems to have worked. The home is now listed as "looking for backup."
----Actor Willem Dafoe has put his house in Accord, New York on the market for $850,000. It was our estate of the day on Saturday.
--Kimora Lee Simmons has put her Beverly Hills home on the market for $7.75 million. It is our estate of the day later today.
--Technology guru Halsey Minor, ho bought a Bel Air home for $20 million in 2006 now has put the home on the market for just $12.9 million. Why? Rumor has it that the much of the home as been stripped down and is empty and dirty. The listing is here.
--TV personality Debbie Matenopoulos and music executive Jay Faires have put their home, Wolf's Lair, shown at right, on the market. The Norman-style castle was built in the 1920s and includes a guest house with interiors by architect John Lautner, a heart-shaped pool and eight bedrooms total on the property. The couple reportedly bought in 2002 for $2.9 million and have now listed it at $7.5 million.

From the LA Times Hot Property:
-- Baseball pitcher Jaret Wright has sold his Dover Shores home in Newport Beach home for $1.67 million.
--Novelist Jackie Collins has eased out a Bel-Air area property she owns for $20,000 a month.
----Looks like Avril Lavigne has finally unloaded her home in the Mulhollland Estates area of Beverly Hills. the home which was first listed in March 2007 for $6.9 million has reportedly received a $5.2 million cash offer.
--Carla J. Christofferson, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks and a partner with the O'Melveny & Myers law firm, has listed her 5,300-square-foot Hollywood Hills home for $5.5 million. The restored 1928 California Spanish-style five-bedroom home includes a THX theater with a 96-inch projection screen. The virtual tour is here.

From Big Time Listings:
--Mr. Big Time takes a look at the real estate doings of Robert Downey Jr. and Hilary Duff.
--Actor and comedian Brad Sherwood has placed his four-bedroom house in Los Angeles' Encino area on the market for $4 million. The listing is here.
--Actor and movie director Michael Apted and his wife, writer Dana Stevens, have paid $1,784,000 for a three-bedroom house in Del Mar, Calif., in San Diego County.
--It's time to play "Which celebrity's house is this?" checking out a six-bedroom house in Brentwood which recently sold after having been on the market for $8,499,000.

From the NY Post's Gimme Shelter:
--Katie Holmes, who is set to appear in a Broadway show in the fall, is on the hunt for a rental on the Upper East Side, she's been spotted cruising apartments with monthly rates over $60,000.
--Entertainment lawyer Paul Schindler has sold his four-story co-op apartment on the Upper East Side for $16.5 million. He and his wife closed on a $13.4 million apartment at the Plaza.
--Ted Koppel has dropped the price of his Potomac, Maryland home. He first listed it in 2005 for $4.1 million and is now asking $1.94 million for the six-bedroom home which as an indoor pool, a gym with a sauna, maid's quarters and a horse barn.
--The Park Avenue apartment of the late socialite and philanthropist Frances Todman has sold for $22 million.
--From Page Six, Philip Seymour Hoffman and his girlfriend Mimi O'Donnell are buying a three-bedroom co-op loft n Manhattan's West Village that had been listed for $4.4 million. Big Time Listings unearthed the listing here.

From the NY Observer's Manhattan Transfers:
--The New York State Court of Appeals has said that a shipping heir named Alistair Economakis and his wife, Catherine can proceed with their plans to take over 47 East Third Street, a a 15-unit, 60-room, 11,600-square-foot rent-stabilized tenement building and turn it into a luxury mansion without getting approval from the state's low-income housing agency. They bought the building and have taken over six apartments, which leaves nine units with tenants who've refused to get bought out.
--Nightlife king Simon Hammerstein has bought his first New York apartment, paying $1.27 million for a loft at 265 Water Street.
--Chinese pianist Lang Lang and his parents have picked up a duplex opposite Carnegie Hall, paying $1.895 million last month for a duplex at City Spire on West 56th Street.
--The brother of Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, the only president in Kazakhstan's 17-year post-U.S.S.R. history, Bolat Nazarbayev and his wife have paid around $20 million for a corner unit facing Central Park at the Plaza.
--Joy and Leonard Toboroff, the 74-year-old vice chairman of a Houston-based oil/gas-drilling outfit named Allis-Chalmers Energy are selling their duplex apartment that stretches across two Tribeca buildings, 39 and 41 North Moore Street with a list price of $17.9 million. The listing is here.