Baseball star Derek Jeter’s double-starred mansion rented by Buccaneer’s quarterback Tom Brady was launched last fall, culminating in a story that fascinates real estate fans and sports fans alike.
Despite rumors that Brady bought a Clearwater home, the alleged sale of that mansion failed and his family remains at Jeter’s property. The home has seven bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and eight half baths, plus a club room with a full-service bar, billiards table, and game table with a glass corner wall overlooking the water.
It also features a wine cellar, movie theater, gym, suite-in-law, au pair wing, air-conditioned six-car garage, scullery, and home generator. The expansive outdoor area includes 9,000 square feet of covered porches and balconies, a dock with two boat lifts, a heated spa, and an 80-foot saltwater lap pool.
So what’s it like selling a massive $ 29 million house, not to mention coordinating show times with the extremely famous residents of the house?
Connected: Derek Jeter lists the Tampa house, Tom Brady’s residence, for $ 29 million
Tampa Realtor Stephen Gay, who works for Smith & Associates, is the listing agent on the property along with colleague Katherine Glaser. Gay spoke to the Tampa Bay Times about the first few months. The following interview has been edited for length and clarity:
Stephen Gay [ Joe Sale Photography, Courtesy of Smith & Associates Real Estate ]
How did you come up with this listing?
We competed with multiple agents both locally and from across the state of Florida who have national brands. That being said, they still liked our presentation the most.
Smith (& Associates), although we are a locally owned company, we are a global network of similar local and operated luxury boutique companies around the world. The network to which we belong is the leading real estate company in the world. In 2019 we sold $ 254 billion.
Have you always specialized in luxury real estate?
No, I’d say it’s something you’ve built on over the years – I’ve been selling for 15 years now. But even though we have a $ 29 million listing, we sold a $ 200,000 home last year. In a market as diverse as Tampa Bay, you can’t pigeonhole yourself. It all pays the bills.
An interior of Derek Jeter’s house offers views of the water and a fireplace. [ Courtesy of Uneek Image ]
What are you doing to market an ultra-luxury offering like this one?
It’s obviously a little different than a $ 200,000 apartment, for example. We marketed to the network I was just talking about and informed them. Many people don’t think of Tampa as a luxury market. We did a marketing push for this network and a lot of people who have been to New York, Chicago, or even California said, “Oh wow, we didn’t know Tampa had houses like this.” So it’s kind of an education for these other brokers, especially now during COVID, when people say, “I don’t want to live in New York City and walk through the same door with 300 of my closest friends every day to get to my house. ‘ People are moving to Florida across the board at the various price levels.
And a $ 29 million home for someone in New York is cheap. You can sometimes pay up to $ 8,000 per square foot for a piece of land that is exactly $ 1,300. And Florida is currently open to business compared to many places that are closed due to COVID. We don’t have state income tax, which is obviously very attractive, and then it’s a place you can be outside for most of the year which is great even in this type of crisis.
But the bigger thing, I think, is that people are now seeing that they can work remotely. People who work on Wall Street don’t have to be on Wall Street anymore.
Then we do the same things that we do for every home like great photos, great videos, and getting the word out. This house was easy to understand because everyone and their brother wanted to write a story about it when they first started.
Do you often speak to Derek Jeter about the listing?
I have a weekly phone call to his team and then he’ll probably come up to you early every three to four weeks for a summary update. And if there’s obviously a lot of activity, he’s sure to join them, which has actually gotten us very interested lately, from California, New York, Virginia, from actual valid people.
New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter speaks during the Baseball Hall of Fame press conference in New York on Wednesday, January 22, 2020. (AP Photo / Bebeto Matthews) [ BEBETO MATTHEWS | AP ]
I get probably three or four calls a week from people who obviously don’t have the funds to buy this house. You just want to get in and see what it looks like. So it was fun filtering through the crazy leads to get to legitimate leads. But we’ve had about seven or eight shows with qualified people. There has been a shocking amount of interest in the past four weeks. So we have calls with Derek and his wife Hannah to give them news.
How do you filter out the serious buyers from people who just want to come in and see the sights?
Thanks to the internet, you can pretty much find out information about anyone these days, especially anyone with the capacity to buy a $ 30 million home. So this is how we do our first research. We get a lot of calls from agents who are so excited that someone called them in this house. Obviously everyone is confident that they will quote “win the lottery”. So we actually supported these agents and researched background information on their leads. And most of them are quite disappointed when we find out information about them.
We bought broker-specific software that allows us to create background information on people who only use their phone number to get information through public records about what kind of cars they own, what real estate they own.
The exterior of the home features fountains, a heated spa, and a saltwater lap pool. [ Courtesy of Uneek Image ]
We had people with a 1987 Honda Civic trying to get in and see the house. Granted, they may have the money to buy it, but probably not, especially if you can’t find any other information about them online.
Ultimately, people have to give us evidence of verifiable funds. A lot of people say, “I’m not really ready to give you my proof of money just yet.” And these are the people who are usually not legitimate. Because when you have the money you are used to such a request and have someone who can easily provide the information to us.
How does it work with Tom Brady, who lives in the house?
They were very, very accommodating and helpful to us because they don’t want to be the reason the house isn’t sold because we can’t get in to show it. So they were super helpful in showing requests and getting everything set up for the show just like they would if it were their own house. They just sold several properties themselves so they know how difficult it is to sell a top luxury property.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady (12) celebrates his fourth quarter touchdown at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans on January 17, 2021. [ DIRK SHADD | Times ]
We must of course notify them in advance so we don’t just call and say, “Can I show it this afternoon?” We’ll let you know in advance. You have not declined any requests.
I imagine that one of the big challenges in selling a home of this size and price could be that anyone who can afford it would choose to build their own mansion instead. How do you deal with it?
What we found is most of the people who look at this house, this is not their first house. This is one of several homes, and they may have gone through this lengthy planning, building, and approval process before building anything like this – it takes about three years. Also, it’s difficult to find such a large land to build on in South Tampa.
The design that enables the construction process is very tedious and many people with the fortune of buying a house of this caliber want instant gratification.
Does associating a property with famous athletes like Derek Jeter and Tom Brady increase its value?
I don’t necessarily think it will add value, but I think it will increase people’s awareness of property. It definitely helps me in my job and publicity to have a famous landlord and tenant connected to the house.
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