Two historic Colorado Springs-area mansions have been sold for far less than their original asking prices.
Scott S. and Cindy F. Monroe of Beaumont, Texas, paid $1.5 million for a 12,000-square-foot mansion on 2.5 acres at 19 Elm Ave. and 9 Berthe Circle, near the Broadmoor Hotel. In 1994, it was on the market for $2.7 million.
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Rockledge Manor, a mansion with more than 20 rooms on 2.8 acres at 328 El Paso Blvd. in Manitou Springs, was sold for $750,000 to Hartman and Nancy M. Smith, franchisees of the two Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory stores in Colorado Springs. Sellers had sought $1.2 million.
Mansions just aren’t selling for what they once did because they must compete with upscale housing developments, said Joe Clement, owner of Re/Max Properties, El Paso County’s largest real estate agency.
“At the high end the seller has to price aggressively to get the property sold because the buyer has so many options,” he said.
“There are so many opportunities for the high-end buyer to build their own home in the Broadmoor Community Resort, Cedar Heights, The Boulders Broadmoor or Stratton Preserve. Three years ago, we didn’t have all these options in this market.”
The Broadmoor-area mansion was built in 1927 by Freda Maytag, daughter of the founder of appliance-maker Maytag. In 1991, Bright Light Ltd., a corporation owned by Cargill Inc. heir Marion MacMillan, bought it for $1.77 million. The house has been vacant for years.
Listing and selling agent Kay Deen Patterson of Prudential Patterson said the property has been on and off the market. Her company had the listing for about two years. “There were many offers,” she said.
Scott Monroe was an investor in the Broadmarket Square office and retail complex in 1992; he and a partner tripled their investment by dividing the auctioned property into commercial condominiums and selling them to local businesses.
The Manitou Springs mansion had been on the market much longer: Seller Ahmed El-Dib put the property up for sale in 1985, asking $1.2 million.
The Rockledge was built in 1912 by Kansan E.H. Heath, who moved his family to the area because of his son’s poor health. The native-greenstone house was built atop red sandstone outcroppings.
In the 1970s it was rented for weddings, receptions, luncheons and bridge parties.
El-Dib, an Egyptian oil attorney, bought it in 1982 for his American wife, Peggy, as a summer home. She died a few years later.