Big Ticket: East Side Mansion Tops February Home Sales

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The Manhattan luxury market saw a flow of activity in townhouses last month, and topping the list of sales was a grand limestone mansion near Central Park that was owned for nearly a decade by the real estate investor Andrew L. Farkas.

The five-story, 22½-foot-wide house, at 12 East 73rd Street off Fifth Avenue, sold for $41,000,000, according to property records. It was the most expensive closed sale in February and one of the city’s priciest townhouse transactions.

Some of the other townhome sales last month included purchases on the Upper East Side by Craig Filipacchi, a prolific real estate broker with Brown Harris Stevens, and in Chelsea by the fashion stylist Karl Templer.

In other notable closed sales, the comedians Samantha Bee and her husband, Jason Jones, bought an apartment on the Upper West Side.

Mr. Farkas, who is the founder and chief executive of the Island Capital Group, a real estate merchant bank, made a tidy profit on his Upper East Side house, which he had listed last year for $42.5 million. He bought the townhouse — once home to the French high school Lycée Français de New York — in April 2007 for $23 million from the private equity investor J. Christopher Flowers. (Just months before, Mr. Flowers had purchased the Harkness Mansion on East 75th Street for $53 million, which is still a townhouse record.)

The home underwent a top-to-bottom renovation that transformed the 10,400-square-foot space into a showplace with five bedrooms, five full baths and three powder rooms, along with formal dining and living rooms, a bar-club room, gym and massage room, among the dozen or so spacious rooms.

There are also nine fireplaces and three kitchens, including one on the landscaped roof terrace, according to the listing with the Corcoran Group. Other outdoor space includes a 500-square-foot south-facing garden and a terrace off the full-floor master suite.

The listing agents, who were part of the Cathy Franklin and Deborah Grubman teams, declined to comment on the deal.

Mr. Farkas, whose family owned the Alexander’s department store chain, sold the house through the limited liability company 12 VQ, and it was purchased by 12E73rd LLC.

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A few blocks away at 58 East 66th Street is another striking limestone mansion. It was acquired by Mr. Filipacchi, who specializes in selling high-end properties, and Tara Wilkinson. The price was $24.18 million, according to property records.

The five-story house, also fully restored and similarly configured, has six bedrooms and five fireplaces within its 9,600 square feet, according to the Corcoran listing. There is ample outdoor space, too, which includes a roof deck, rear garden and two terraces. The seller’s identity was shielded by a limited liability company.

Mr. Templer’s townhouse, at 348 West 22nd Street, near Ninth Avenue, was more modest in size and price. However, it will likely need some work, along with Mr. Templer’s styling chops, to restore it to its original grandeur. It sold for $8 million.

The 21-foot-wide Greek Revival-style brick house was built in the early 1840s on a site that once served as home to Clement Clarke Moore, the author of the poem “’Twas the Night Before Christmas.”

The home has around 4,300 square feet over four stories that is currently configured as an upper triplex with two first-floor studios, according to the listing with the brokerage firm Leslie J. Garfield.

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Mr. Templer’s work as a stylist has appeared in several publications, including the international editions of Vogue.

Ms. Bee and Mr. Jones paid $3.7 million for unit 14EF at 300 Riverside Drive, a brick and limestone co-op building at West 102nd Street. Their 2,200-square-foot apartment has four bedrooms and two and a half baths, along with an eat-in kitchen, a sizable family room and laundry and storage.

Ms. Bee hosts the show “Full Frontal” on TBS. She and Mr. Jones were also correspondents on the “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart.”

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