A Palm Springs, California, estate belonging to 102-year-old Pulitzer Prize-winning author Herman Wouk, is headed to the market soon, Mansion Global has learned.
The desert property will be priced at $2.49 million, said listing broker Ernie Carswell of Douglas Elliman, who is handling the sale, along with his colleague Scott Lyle.
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Built in 1934, the rock-covered main house looks like "something you might expect to see in Montana," Mr. Carswell said. It has six bedrooms, six-and-a-half bathrooms and spans over 5,000 square feet. Also on the 1.6-acre property is an almost 2,000-square-foot guest house, a pool and a tennis court. Surrounded by perimeter walls and tall hedges, the property is private with discrete entries and exits.
Mr. Wouk is "very passionate about his home," Mr. Carswell said. "It's his refuge."
The author paid just under $1 million for the property in June of 1983, from the estate of the late actress Natalie Wood and her husband, actor Robert Wagner, Mr. Carswell said.
"This was their love nest," Mr. Carswell said. "One of the trees on the property is a fig tree that [Natalie] bought for Robert after a quarrel."
When they bought the home—sometime between 1969 and 1970, Mr. Carswell said—the property consisted only of the main house. In 1970, Wood added the three-bedroom guest house which frequently housed her mother along with Marlon Brando, who would visit the couple.
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Wood died in 1981, after drowning while on a weekend boat trip to Santa Catalina Island. Many of the circumstances surrounding her drowning are reportedly unknown.
Some time after the sale, Mr. Wagner returned to visit the house. "He just wanted to stop by and say hello," Mr. Carswell said.
The Bronx-born Mr. Wouk, who was not available to comment, is currently writing his next book in the home. He’s ready to move to a more manageable property, Mr. Carswell said.
"At 102 he's still working," he said. "But it makes a lot of sense to pare down a little to have less to maintain." He will stay in Palm Springs, Mr. Carswell added.
Mr. Wouk’s 1951 novel "The Caine Mutiny" won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Other works include "The Winds of War,""War and Remembrance" and "This Is My God."