List Price: $3.95 million
Sale Price: $3.19 million
The Property: Frank Calabrese, a longtime owner of thoroughbred horses with impressive records at Arlington Park and in Florida, has sold his custom-built 15-room house in Park Ridge for $3.192 million. According to Midwest Real Estate Data, that’s the highest sale price on record for that northwest suburb—and Calabrese’s agent, Danny McGovern, says that the buyers paid cash.
The 7,200-square-foot house, built in 2005, backs up to the Park Ridge Country Club. Documents on file at the Cook County Recorder of Deeds do not reveal what Calabrese paid for the land or for construction, and McGovern wouldn’t say. Photos that accompanied the listing show a richly detailed interior, with a curving staircase beneath a large chandelier, beamed ceilings and extensive woodwork in the formal rooms, and a two-story living room with stacked windows overlooking a swimming pool. According to McGovern, the first-floor master suite also looks over the pool and an outdoor fireplace. He adds that the house “has phenomenal finishes” both inside and out, including a full slate roof and a second kitchen in the basement that’s adjacent to a movie theatre.
The house went on the market in mid-August. (The reason for selling? “You’ve got an 83-year-old homeowner,” McGovern says.) Two potential buyers vied for the house, and the one whose offer was lower but whose terms were more solid—the all-cash buyer—prevailed. The sale closed October 14; the buyers are not yet identified in public records. I could not reach Frank Calabrese for comment, but he is not the reputed mobster with the same name.
Price Points: McGovern says that the sale price tops Park Ridge’s old record price by more than $600,000. He was also the agent on that $2.5 million sale, as well as on what he thinks is the third-priciest home in Park Ridge. Both of those homes are adjacent to the long ribbon of Cook County Forest Preserve on the western edge Park Ridge. (I haven’t yet received independent confirmation from MRED on the record status of those other two properties.)
Listing Agent: Danny McGovern of ReMax Northwest; 847-698-7000 or dannymcgovern@remax.net