It doesn’t come with a red Bat phone or a British butler named Alfred, but the 5.6-acre home and property built on a mountaintop in Park City, Utah, has some similarities to the stately Wayne Manor in Batman lore.
It's not only very secluded, it has a unique design and sits on a mountaintop. And, with an asking price of $22.9 million, the property is posh enough for a billionaire.
Windermere Real Estate and Luxury Portfolio International are comparing the Utah house with the well-known character that has spanned comic books, television and motion pictures as a marketing technique for the distinctive property. Designed by architect Wallace Cunningham of San Diego, the 8,000-square-foot house has four bedrooms, eight bathrooms, custom furniture, walnut floors, a sunken hot tub and a Japanese soaking tub. It also includes floor-to-ceiling windows, a glass and steel elevator, media and yoga rooms and a floating fireplace.
So far, it’s one of two houses included in the Wayne Enterprises Experience, a so-called ecosystem of luxury items designed to appeal to enthusiasts of Bruce Wayne, the fictional Gotham City billionaire philanthropist and DC Comics superhero.
“You can’t get more iconic than that,” Jennifer Woodring, Luxury Portfolio’s vice president of marketing and brand collaborations, told CoStar News. Luxury Portfolio markets global properties with member real estate firms and advisers.
The marketing package in partnership with Relevance International and Warner Bros. Discovery Global Consumer Products is designed to get homebuyers “to think about luxury real estate from a new angle,” Luxury Portfolio said in a statement. The marketing is free for the company's member firms.
A second home in the collection is a planned 21,640-square-foot mansion on Lanai Island in Dubai listed with Savoir Privé Properties for $20 million. Two properties a month will be added to the collection through the end of the year, Woodring said.
The secluded Park City estate, completed in 2013, fits the Batman marketing plan because it's exactly the kind of pad Wayne would have owned, Windermere co-listing agent Alan Long said in an interview. It was supposed to take three years to build and cost $8 million, but it ended up taking eight years and $18 million, he added.
"There was no budget in building this home," Long said.
The listing has been on the market for nearly 600 days, and the owner reduced the asking price by $6 million earlier this year, according to CoStar's Homes.com.
Long, who declined to identify the owner, said he advised his client that taking advantage of the Batman marketing mystique is a good strategy to boost visibility.
The home is about a 15-minute drive from the nearest ski slope so it can't command the top level of luxury pricing achieved by homes located on ski runs, the agent said. In addition, the estate was custom designed and built specifically for the original owner, limiting the buyer pool, according to Long.
By the time the original owner could move in, he was 78 and lived there only two years before putting it on the market, according to Long. The agent said the current owner was a bachelor when he bought it, a la Bruce Wayne, but is now married with a baby, and the property isn't child-proof.
Selling the house a second time, Long works with co-listing agents Daimon Bushi and Dash Longe of Windermere.
The glass, steel, concrete and stone estate offers expansive views of the Park City mountains, according to the listing.
An entire wing has a three-room suite with a large solid walnut door, and the primary bathroom features dual bathrooms and sinks, dual dressing areas and the soaking tub.
Outside, there's a waterfall and a heated patio big enough to host "hundreds" of guests year-round, according to the listing.
Though the home can't be seen from the street or from other houses, it's part of a private gated community with three 18-hole golf courses and other amenities, according to Long. What's more, included with the property is an adjacent 37.12-acre parcel that serves as a view easement, ensuring that no neighbor can ever build anything that blocks the home's view.
Long said he weeds out people who aren't serious buyers and are only interested in touring the house to see its unique design. But he said he has shown it to a handful of billionaires, noting it takes time to find the right buyer for such a distinctive residence.
"A lot of people can't relate to strong architectural houses," he said. "You need a huge personality to live in this house."
And, given the price, perhaps Bruce Wayne's bank account.
About That Listing explores how brokers market distinctive properties. Let us know about your unusual listing at news@costar.com.