Long Island Buyers Face Parcelized Purchases After Billy Joel Estate Sells
Wednesday at 2: 15 p. m. ET, Billy Joel’s Centre Island property changed hands, shifting ownership of a 26-acre waterfront compound and leaving buyers to acquire pieces of the estate after it spent nearly three years on the market.
Long Island buyers confronting parcelized sales after Billy Joel began cutting up the estate
Billy Joel began selling portions of the property rather than moving a single buyer into the whole compound, and the first piece to depart the estate was the seven-bedroom, nine-bathroom gatehouse, which sold last year for $7 million. That early sale set the pattern of separate transactions for distinct parcels.
Centre Island manor and adjoining lots brought tens of millions after multiple listing attempts
The primary brick manor later sold for $23. 2 million, and a pair of adjoining lots sold for $2. 75 million each, producing an itemized total of $35. 75 million for those components. The property had first been offered at $49 million in 2023, was taken off the market for renovation, and returned in 2024 with a $49. 9 million asking price before the owner opted to divest parts.
Emmett Laffey recorded a Long Island outside-Hamptons high for the multi-structure MiddleSea estate
Emmett Laffey of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Laffey International Realty represented the seller and recorded what was described as the priciest residential transaction on Long Island outside the Hamptons. The primary dwelling, completed in the early 1990s and dubbed MiddleSea, contains five en suite bedrooms and 11 bathrooms across roughly 20, 000 square feet, with 30-foot ceilings, hardwood and marble floors, an elevator and nautical-inspired decor.
Additional on-site features include a mahogany-clad library with a stone fireplace, a ballroom, a spa, a wine cellar, two swimming pools, a tennis court, a floating dock, a boat ramp, a three-bedroom Malibu-style beach house, and a three-bedroom guesthouse that houses a two-lane bowling alley and a four-car garage; the compound also includes an on-site helipad.
A major reason cited for the decision to sell was the property’s hefty annual tax bill, which had eclipsed $567, 000, and the owner — who acquired the core of the estate in 2002 for $22. 5 million and later added adjoining parcels to reach the 26-acre footprint — still retains other New York residences.
If additional parcels from the compound are sold, the final proceeds would increase above the currently reported totals.
