Mediterranean mansions are so passe

TAMPA - The waterfront mansion on Davis Islands was so sublime, a $40,000 sound system was embedded in the pool's limestone walls so swimmers could do the backstroke in concert with underwater melodies.

The Italian villa was so spectacular, it was outfitted with a mahogany English pub.

The seven-bathroom residence was so painstakingly appointed, the crown moldings from Canada were a foot high, the wine cellar could cradle 8,500 bottles, and faucets were nothing less than 24-carat gold.

And the estate was so stunning, someone recently paid millions for the right to obliterate the whole caboodle.

"When they start bull-dozing, I think I'll be sick," said D.V. Preiser, the Tampa interior designer whose meticulous masterpiece is bound for the dump.

"It was one of my finest hours," said Preiser, 53.

The man behind the wrecking ball apparently guards his privacy and is not inclined to interviews. His real estate agent, Toni Everett, wasn't giving up a thing Monday, even though she had trumpeted the sale the day before in a newspaper ad.

"I can't give you any more information," Everett sniffed Monday, clearly irritated that anyone would want to know who was moving to town and toppling one of the area's biggest eye-poppers.

But property records lists the purchaser as Mitchell Rales. It shows he bought the smaller house next door, too. Forbes Magazine in March ranked Rales, at age 46, as the 329th wealthiest man in the world. He is worth a cool $1.3-billion.

The mansion he bought at 58 Bahama Circle was on the market for several months and listed at $4.2-million. The other house was listed at more than $1.7-million, although it wasn't for sale until Rales showed up.

That puts a whole new perspective on the purchases: What's a piddling $5.9-million or so for a couple of houses you don't want?

"Do ya feel like trash?" Preiser summarized it, not without some humor.

Word of Rales' purchases spread fast on Davis Islands, a sidewalk-strewn bubble of more and more fat mansions on anorexic lots. When news of the demolitions hit the ears of Tampa City council member Linda Saul-Sena, it initially sent her head spinning.

Exactly what Tampa doesn't need, Saul-Sena has argued, are more "McMansions." Perhaps, she feared, that was what Rales had in mind, a double whammy.

No, Everett assured. Her client has no intention of making a house bigger than the big one he is tearing down. He merely wanted a double parcel for more green, she said.

"They want a lot of foliage," she said.

Rales and his brother Steven started Danaher Corp., a giant conglomeration known for its hostile takeovers and drastic downsizing. Its best-known line is Craftsman Tools.

Rales' new purchases combined are 1.3 acres. Acreage is the yardstick used in open, grassy places like Brandon, not sardine-packed neighborhoods like Davis Islands. And the fact that it's right on the water, well, that renders it a regular bonanza.

"It's a big deal," said Rick Parsons, editor-in-chief for the duPont Registry, an international magazine of lavish estates.

Michael and Tami Siewruk sold Rales the larger house, constructed in 1940. Preiser had slapped stucco over the brick facade, before giving the interior a complete makeover, at a cost of about $5-million, he said. According to Preiser, even a Swedish princess lived there once. The Siewruks could not be reached to confirm.

Former TECO executive H.L. Culbreath and his wife Betty sold Rales the smaller house. It was built in the 1950s.

"We certainly enjoyed it while we were there," Mrs. Culbreath said Monday.

How about the fact that it will soon be mashed like so many potatoes? "I'm sure that what they're going to do is going to be nice," Mrs. Culbreath said.

For Rales, who owns a home in Maryland and who knows where else, this is no Davis Islands debut. Last summer, he bought a waterfront lot just a mile away, at 80 Ladoga Ave.

That half-acre site didn't work out.

"It was too small," Everett said.

- Staff writer Amy Scherzer and researcher John Martin contributed to this report. Kathryn Wexler can be reached at wexler@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3383.

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