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January 4, 2007 Greenwich, Conn., long home to the palatial estates of the region's wealthier families, is now the focus of hundreds of millions of dollars in investment from a pair of developers looking to build homes for the next generation of wealth. The co-founders of Antares Investment Partners, Joseph Beninati and James Cabrera, are seeking to appeal to a select audience flush with cash from a banner year on Wall Street, where bonuses reached an estimated $23.9 billion. Messrs. Beninati and Cabrera — whose vertically integrated real estate company controls a portfolio of residential and commercial property worth $4.5 billion, and manages the financial, legal, and construction aspects of development — are heavily invested in the highend Greenwich market, where prices rose about 50% last year. In the area known as Greenwich's "horse country," Antares is developing Taconic Estates, comprised of seven properties valued at roughly $11 million a piece. Nearby, Antares is building the Lake Carrington Estate, which is expected to fetch $25 million — before the interior is designed. "The Carrington Estate," Mr. Beninati told The New York Sun, "is, incidentally, the largest home in Greenwich." The stone Georgian-style home has a basement that would put most resorts to shame, as well as a combination squash-basketball court, a 10,000-bottle wine cellar and tasting room, a lap pool, and a fitness center that could well out do the local Equinox. Messrs. Beninati and Cabrera say their prospective customers are a growing class of business people from hedge funds, private equity shops, and investment banks who may not be celebrities or socialites, but would like to raise a family in a country setting that lacks the tax burden of Westchester or Manhattan. With this vision in mind, Messrs. Beninati and Cabrera bought up some 60 acres of prime real estate in Greenwich over the last four years and are at the end stages of erecting eight "family complexes" with classical exteriors and modern interiors. By integrating family spaces like kitchens and playrooms into the central, social areas, the developers say their new mansions are tailored to a young family demographic. "We suspect that somebody will really grow a family here," Mr. Benanit said of the 10 acre, 41,000- square-foot Lake Carrington Estate. While Greenwich remains an attractive location for a sprawling estate, the city's zoning and conservation interests can present particular challenges to developers. Over the past few years, endeavors to erect mega-mansions have met with stiff resistance from the wellconnected and -funded Greenwich community. In March, fierce opposition to airline director Joseph Jacob's plans to erect a 39,000-square-foot behemoth forced Mr. Jacobs to abandon his plans, at least temporarily. So far, Antares Investment Partners seem to have avoided those pitfalls with its Greenwich projects. The developers, in addressing the inevitable planning, zoning and conservation issues with their legal team, say they paved the way for a smooth rollout when the Carrington property goes on the market later this month. Although development in Greenwich comes with added costs, Antares is angling to get a piece of what it perceives to be a lucrative market. "We saw the two engines driving this market," Mr. Beninati said. "First, large amounts of wealth were being focused on Greenwich and on buying up big pieces of land. And second, there was non-economic absorption. There is a development-hostile environment here. And the impact of those two things has created scarcity value for the remaining land that is here." Among the developers' other projects is a condominium in downtown Greenwich. In February 2006, they purchased two existing rental complexes for $233 million in what was then the largest real estate acquisition in Connecticut history. The complexes are now undergoing a $150 million renovation and conversion into condominiums. The developers also are working on a $3.5 billion urban redevelopment plan in nearby downtown Stamford that could eventually include 4,000 housing units. Even with such a large investment in the local real estate market, a potential downward correction in the housing market is of little concern to the developers. "There's always a market for van Goghs, and there's always a market for back country mansions in Greenwich," Mr. Benaniti said. "Markets are pretty much irrelevant here," he added. "It just depends which group of guys in the world are on top. So it might be the Russian oil barons, the hedge fund guys, or the private equity guys today. In the next few years it might be the venture capitalists, the tech guys, and the Japanese guys. It is just a rotation of who has the millions and millions."
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