Talk about power.
Former Morgan Stanley honcho John Mack and his wife, Christy, have put their converted Upper East Side carriage house on the market for a staggering $80 million, making it the most expensive townhouse currently for sale in New York.
If a buyer pays, the deal would shatter the borough’s townhouse record, set in June 2019 when 14 East 67th Street, a 22,000-square-foot mansion, traded for $77.1 million.
“If this listing ends up selling for $80 million, it would be the highest townhouse sale ever in Manhattan,” appraiser Jonathan Miller of Miller Samuel told the Post.
“If there’s any house that deserves this record, it’s this one,” listing agent Mike Fabbri of The Agency told the Post.
The Macks acquired 165 East 70th Street for $13.5 million in 2009, real estate records show, when John was still running the Wall Street giant. At the time, the 33-foot-wide building had never been a house.
“It was a distressed property,” Fabbri said. “It’s always been used as a garage.”
What followed was six years of instinctive work, with Christy leading the design, according to Fabbri. The couple kept the limestone facade, added a floor and reinforced the innards with steel beams, transforming the stable into a mansion of approximately 16,000 square feet with 20 rooms.
“It took our client six years to realize this and build this,” Fabbri said.
The Macks had been looking for a move-in ready townhouse for about a decade before deciding to build their own, he said. Now the couple is cashing out and retiring to North Carolina, where both grew up.
John, who led Morgan Stanley as CEO during the 2008 financial crisis, stepped down as chairman in 2011.
Security has been built in from the start, with a bulletproof front door, state-of-the-art alarm system and dedicated security offices.
“I think everything was thought of in this house, even safety and security,” Fabbri said, adding that the house was “built like a fortress.”
Creature comforts are just as serious. A snow melting system keeps the sidewalk clear in winter.
“So when it snows outside, the sidewalk in front of the house melts the snow,” Fabbri said.
Inside, radiant heat circulates everywhere. “Not just the bedrooms and bathrooms, because every floor is heated,” he said. The HVAC was replaced this year.
The winery functions as a private health club with a hot tub, cold pool, hammam, sauna and massage room. There’s a 13-seat screening room, a 6,319-bottle wine cellar, two elevators (one high-speed), six wood-burning fireplaces and three landscaped terraces, including a 480-square-foot rooftop perch.
Then there’s Manhattan’s rarest luxury, a private curb leading to a garage that doubles as a party space.
“You usually give up something to live in a townhouse,” Fabbri said. “You have everything in this house.”
The building dates to 1902, when architect CPH Gilbert, the talent behind some of Fifth Avenue’s grandest homes, designed it for banker Henri P. Wertheim.
“It’s not like you can recreate a CPH Gilbert house,” Fabbri said.
Only five owners have held the keys for more than a century, according to Fabbri. The list includes Singer sewing machine heir Stephen C. Clark and Paul and Bunny Mellon, who used it as a private garage before selling it to the Macks.
Rather than erasing the building’s cart past, the renovation integrated it directly into the design. The old railings, scarred by decades of hooves, turned out to be virgin chestnut slabs. They now wrap the lower level gym in the form of paneling.
For Fabbri, the real selling point is that the next owner won’t have to lift a finger.
“It’s completely turnkey, that’s the magic word,” he said. “It’s not just a showpiece, as it is. It’s also a really functional place.”
Gn bussni
