STORY TOOLS

• E-mail story
• iPod friendly
• Printer friendly

Tell us about it

• What would you add to this story? Tell us what we missed.
• Do you have photos from this event? Documents we need to see? Share with us.
• Upload photos & videos
• More ways to get your stuff online and in the paper.

More Business

• Merchants pulling out all the stops to encourage Islanders to shop local
• Electronics tops Marco wish lists, but it’s not all
• LIVE BLOG: From more than a dozen grandkids to really early shoppers ... Black Friday swirls

Share and Enjoy [?]

Eclipsing the highest price ever paid for a single family home on Marco Island, a mansion on Inlet Drive in the Estates section of the island has sold for around $8 million. The exact price was not disclosed, but seller’s agent Pat Wilkins said it had been listed at $8.5 million.

Wilkins was responsible for the other two highest-price sales as well: the Turley Mansion off Copeland Drive in the early 1990s for $3.5 million, and a mansion at the tip of Heights Court for $7.5 million more recently.

Because the closing has not yet taken place, Wilkins said, buyers and sellers names are not being publicized.

Wilkins said the sale represents a healthy shot in the arm for real estate in general.

“I think this sets a precedent,” he said.

Working primarily off the Internet and through e-mails, buyer’s agent Helga Wetzold of Prudential Florida WCI Realty recently teamed with Wilkins, of RE/MAX Results Realty, to throw a cocktail party for the buyers at 1809 Inlet Drive.

“The sellers gave us the house for the evening,” Wilkins said. “The house overlooks Caxambas Pass and an oyster bed, which at low tide is a virtual wildlife sanctuary.”

QUENTIN ROUX / Eagle staff

In what is believed to be the highest price ever fetched for a single family home on Marco Island, 1809 Inlet Drive has sold for around $8 million. Closing is imminent, and the exact sale price has not yet been released.

“On that evening we saw manatees, stingrays, ospreys teaching their young to fish, and also a roseate spoonbill,” said George Percel, branch manager of Prudential.

Percel said the deal for the buyer was facilitated by his company offering a “Prima Service,” which is an online Internet marketing assistant.

“Our agents have their own Web sites, and all leads come to them off their own sites,” he said.

A further advantage, he said, is that all Prima agents’ listings are enhanced on Realtor.com, which he described as “the number one real estate portal in the world, whether we like it or not.”

Percel said one of the advantages of Prima is that when leads come through the system, agents automatically get phone prompts for quick reaction.

“Today’s customer wants instant gratification,” Percel said. “I think the buyer responded because of this promptness.”

The mansion in Inlet Drive has 7,000 square feet under air, and 11,000 square feet total. It has all the bells and whistles one would expect from a house of this nature, Wilkins said, not least the vanishing pool.

“It’s just upscale, and well-built,” he said.

Wilkins added it should be mentioned that there are more expensive homes than 1809 on Marco Island, but that they have to date not sold.