Grey Gardens, the once derelict East Hampton, New York, home of society outcasts that inspired one of the highest-regarded documentaries of all time, has taken a $2 million price cut.
The fully restored mansion at the center of the 1975 film "Grey Gardens" hit the market for the first time in nearly 40 years in February for $19.995 million—and is now selling for $17.995 million, according to the listing with The Corcoran Group.
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The seller, journalist Sally Quinn, bought the 6,000-square-foot, traditional shingle-style summer home in 1979. She’s since shared decades of memories with her family and is now ready to move on and sell the home, said listing agent Michael Schultz of Corcoran. He is listing the property with fellow Corcoran agent Susan Ryan.
Ms. Quinn and her husband, the late Washington Post Executive Editor Ben Bradlee, bought the property just a few years after the bizarre film about two society recluses, known as "Big Edie" and "Little Edie," made their absolutely decrepit house famous.
Ms. Quinn and Mr. Bradlee snapped up the home for just $220,000 from Edith "Little Edie" Beale, the first cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and poured another $600,000 into making it livable again, The Wall Street Journal reported. They also added a pool and a tennis court.
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The famous documentary contrasted the decaying, overgrown house, built in 1897, against tidy, neighboring mansions. Today the restored two-acre property that’s a short walk from the ocean fits right into its neatly manicured environs. The main house has nine bedrooms and six-and-a-half bathrooms. There’s also a small stucco cottage on the grounds where Bradlee reportedly wrote one of his books.
Before the owners’ painstaking overhaul, the home had for years been home to the Beale women and teeming with mostly feral cats. Film crews had to wear flea collars on their ankles to keep the bugs at bay, according to a website for the movie.
In one scene, the mother, "Big Edie" Beale, lets a cat relieve itself behind an antique painting.
"The cat’s going to the bathroom right in back of my portrait," she notices. "I’m glad someone is doing something they want to."