By J.S. MARCUS

STATS: A three-room, 1,260-square-foot co-op apartment, with an eat-in kitchen and one bathroom, asking 8.7 million kronor (around $1.3 million), or $1,030 per square foot. Co-op charges, including property taxes and most utilities, are around 1,550 SEK a month. The apartment has electric heating, supplemented by wood-burning antique stoves. Electricity, billed separately, averages around 8,000 SEK a year.

DETAILS: Located on a quiet side street of Gamla Stan, or Old Town, the apartment is on the third floor of a 17th-century house with medieval foundations. The apartment underwent structural changes in the mid-19th century, resulting in 11-foot ceilings, which are substantially higher than in many other apartments in this part of Stockholm. The pine floors in the apartment also date back to the 19th century. The owners bought the unit in March 2011 and undertook a complete renovation, installing a new Poggenpohl kitchen. Although it’s just off a major tourist thoroughfare, the apartment is remarkably quiet. Unlike many apartments in Gamla Stan, the apartment also gets a lot of natural light.

SELLERS: Eva Darpö, a Swedish glass artist, and Bo Palmquist, former technical director of the Malmö Opera.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD: Stockholm’s Gamla Stan is one of Europe’s best-preserved historic neighborhoods. In recent years, it has attracted a number of new restaurants and night spots, as well as a steady stream of tourists.

WHAT WE PAID: The couple paid 7.2 million SEK and invested a further 800,000 SEK in renovations.

WHY WE’RE SELLING: Soon after moving in, the couple heard about a farm for sale on the island of FÃ¥rö, associated with film director Ingmar Bergman, who lived there for many years. Ms. Darpö, 58, and Mr. Palmquist, 63, decided to move to the island full-time.

WHAT WE’LL MISS: The convenience. “I walk everywhere,” says Ms. Darpö.

WHAT WE WON’T: Driving restrictions. Ms. Darpö says she is only allowed to drive her car, which she must keep several blocks away, down her street a few hours in the morning; she otherwise needs permission from the city.

COMP: A short walk away, a 1,313-square-foot apartment recently sold for 8.7 million SEK.

OTHERS SAY:
Mattias Schultz, a Stockholm-based real-estate broker, says that the price and historical elements place the listing “in a high-end category of apartments in Stockholm.” He points out that the apartment, like most in Gamla Stan, does not have a balcony, a drawback for many Stockholm residents. Johan Derelöv of Skeppsholmen Sotheby’s International Realty is handling the sale.

By SARAH TILTON

Open House

331 Greer Rd.

Woodside, Calif.

STATS: A home of about 9,000 square feet, with nine bedrooms and 8½ bathrooms, on about 92 acres, asking $85 million, or $924,515.98 per acre. Property taxes in 2011 were $7,943.62.

DETAILS: This Colonial-style home has been in the same family since it was built in 1941. It has been host to politicians (John Kennedy, before he was president) as well as the scene of weddings and family gatherings. At the eldest daughter’s debutante party in the late 1950s, the Kingston Trio played and the guests stayed until 6 a.m. The property includes a pool, a tennis court, a Thomas Church-designed garden and a three-stall barn. There is also a two-bedroom gatehouse and a two-bedroom caretaker’s house with its own garden. A 125,000-gallon private water tank on a hill feeds the two lakes.

SELLERS: The estate of Elizabeth Dresser Flood, who died in April 2011 at the age of 94. Even in her early 90s, Mrs. Flood still enjoyed stacking a cord of wood, driving the red Talbot car that she got on her honeymoon and herding cattle at her Santa Barbara ranch. Mrs. Flood was predeceased by her husband, James Flood, the grandson of Comstock legend James Clair Flood.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD: It’s less than 10 minutes to downtown Woodside and breakfast at Buck’s, a favorite with the venture-capital set. Or stay closer to home and enjoy the hiking and riding trails.

WHAT WE PAID: The Floods’ eldest son, James, estimates that his parents spent $100,000 on the land and the building of the main house.

WHY WE’RE SELLING: Mrs. Flood’s death.

WHAT WE’LL MISS: “It’s the end of an era,” says the Floods’ eldest daughter, Judy Flood Wilbur, noting that many other older estates have been subdivided. “It was a perfect place to grow up,” says Mr. Flood. He remembers learning to milk the family’s cow during World War II, so that they had plenty of milk, butter and cheese, and driving a tractor at age 10.

WHAT WE WON’T: Bicycling back up the hill to the house after a trip to downtown Woodside, says Mrs. Wilbur.

COMP: Nearby, a 14,000-square-foot house with four bedrooms and six bathrooms on 3.4 acres is asking $39.5 million.

OTHERS SAY:
Mary Gebhardt of Alain Pinel Realtors says the property stands out because of the acreage, the proximity to town and the views. “You never see this kind of land,” she says. Mary Gullixson, Brent Gullixson and Maureen Ryan of Alain Pinel Realtors share the listing.

Write to Sarah Tilton at sarah.tilton@wsj.com

A version of this article appeared September 7, 2012, on page D11A in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Historic Estate, Huge Price.

HENDERSON, Nev.

$1.99 million

A roughly 6,200-square-foot home with five bedrooms and five baths, on 0.37 acre, about 15 miles southeast of Las Vegas

DETAILS: This two-story Mediterranean-style home, built in 2003, has a screening room and wine cellar in the basement and several fireplaces. There’s an inner courtyard, a pool and one-bedroom guest house.

RACK ‘EM: A game room on the second story opens onto a terrace and has a bar.

PUB FOOD: At Kennedy Tavern, three miles away, appetizers include calamari and ahi tuna chips.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Mostly sunny, high 81 degrees

SOURCE:
Florence Shapiro and Ivan Sher, Prudential Americana Group Realtors, 702-315-0223, Florence@lasvegasfinehomes.com; Realtor.com

SANTA FE, N.M.

$2 million

A 9,100-square-foot home with four bedrooms and four baths, on 1.1 acres near downtown

DETAILS: This two-story 1970s home, expanded and renovated in 2007, has mountain views and beamed ceilings. There’s a gym, wine cellar with tasting room and an attached one-bedroom, one-bath guest house. There’s also an inner courtyard.

RACK ‘EM: The game room sits between the main house and the guest house. It opens onto a patio and has several skylights.

PUB FOOD: Catamount Bar & Grille, about three miles away, offers nachos, wings and sliders, along with live music on some weekends.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Chance of rain, high 76 degrees

SOURCE:
Neil Lyon, Sotheby’s International Realty, 505-954-5505, neil@neillyon.com

ORLANDO, Fla.

$2 million

An almost 6,000-square-foot home, with five bedrooms and six baths, on more than a half-acre

DETAILS: This contemporary house, built in 1999 in a gated community, has golf-course views, 24-foot ceilings and a home theater. It comes with a pool and a dock on a canal leading to a lake. A 21-foot Tigé ski boat is included.

RACK ‘EM: The first-floor game room is currently set up with a pool table and a ping-pong table. There are canal views.

PUB FOOD: Vines Grille & Wine Bar, about three miles away, has live jazz every night and serves fries with truffle aioli and spicy lamb meatballs at the bar.

FRIDAY’S FORECAST: Chance of rain, high 90 degrees

SOURCE:
Ann Varkey, Re/Max Properties SW, 407-352-5800, annvarkey@earthlink.net; Realtor.com

—Juliet ChungPrinted in The Wall Street Journal, page W11A

By SARAH TILTON

Open House

320 Harcross Rd.

Woodside, Calif.

STATS: A 14,651-square-foot home, according to the owner, with seven bedrooms, seven full bathrooms and two half-bathrooms on almost 5 acres, coming up for auction without reserve Oct. 27 through Concierge Auctions. The house was previously listed for $21 million and later for $13 million. Property taxes in 2011 were $162,229.44.

DETAILS: Built in the 1920s in the style of a French château, this home includes a marble entrance, a ballroom, a billiards room and a 5,000-bottle wine cellar. A dumbwaiter connects the two kitchens, in case you’re entertaining on a grand scale. The property also has a citrus grove, two greenhouses, formal French gardens, a cutting garden, a tennis court, a pool and a croquet lawn. The new owners will have to negotiate their own contract with the manager of the private vineyard if they want him to stay.

SELLER: Le Soleil De Chamonix LLC, of which one of the beneficiaries is Kevin Kalkhoven. An Australian venture capitalist, Mr. Kalkhoven is the former chief executive officer of JDS Uniphase.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD: It’s less than 10 minutes to dinner at the Village Pub in downtown Woodside, a favorite of Mr. Kalkhoven.

WHAT WE PAID: The owners paid $16.3 million for the home in 2000 through a limited-liability company. Over the years, Mr. Kalkhoven estimates that another $3.8 million was spent updating and maintaining the property, including bringing artisans from France to create the gold-leaf ceiling in the ballroom.

WHY WE’RE SELLING: Mr. Kalkhoven has relocated to the East Bay.

WHAT WE’LL MISS: “The feeling of glamour that you get when you walk into it,” says Mr. Kalkhoven. “You walk through the gate and you feel like you’re a million miles away from Silicon Valley, and you’re 10 minutes from Silicon Valley.”

WHAT WE WON’T: Waking up every morning and seeing the gym attached to the master bedroom. “It drove me crazy,” says Mr. Kalkhoven, adding that he still exercises but is happy not to get up in the morning and immediately see the gym.

COMP: Nearby, an approximately 9,000-square-foot house with nine bedrooms and 8½ bathrooms on 92 acres is asking $85 million.

OTHERS SAY:
Mary Gebhardt of Alain Pinel Realtors says the property stands out because of the gardens, the flat acreage and the architecture of the house. “It’s a grand scale house in the old world sense,” she says. “It’s like Versailles.” Mary Gullixson and Brent Gullixson of Alain Pinel Realtors share the listing.

Write to Sarah Tilton at sarah.tilton@wsj.com

A version of this article appeared September 28, 2012, on page D7A in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Silicon Valley Versailles.

Step One: Pick a simple color scheme. My inspiration was the bronze amaranthus, with some pops of dusty pink, peach and orange. Start with a base of branches (we used crab apple), which will create the movement and shape of the arrangement. We used a footed silver bowl for a wide and open display and let the branches splay out.

Step Two: Fill in and around the branches with hydrangea and any other foliage (we used some burning bush). Cut your stems quite low and tuck them deep in the arrangement. Next, place the more showy flowers. Cluster like blooms and similar colors together for maximum impact, but make sure they are not all on the same level nor facing the same direction. Step Three: Finish the arrangement with some playful gestures of wild grasses.

Step Three: Finish the arrangement with some playful gestures of wild grasses.

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page D11

Courtesy Rizzoli

Recently the sunburst mirror has gone mainstream, with chains offering modest-priced replicas of vintage designs.

With bleak winter days upon us, a mirror will refract each precious ray of sunlight—and the sunburst mirror seems to stand in for the sun itself.

No wonder, then, the newly married couple painted by Jan van Eyck in 1434 invested in a bulls-eye convex mirror, living as they did in the sun-deprived city of Bruges. Fast-forward to the 17th century when Louis XIV established the first glass and mirror factory in Northern Europe at St. Gobain, France. In doing so, he broke the Venetian Republic’s monopoly on the making of these precious commodities, and, in the process, raised the aesthetic and technological bar by making mirrors bigger and clearer than ever before.

Despite Louis XIV’s affinity for mirrors and for the sunburst motif—the personal emblem of the self-styled “Sun King” was a head of Apollo surrounded by rays of light—the sunburst mirror didn’t make an appearance during his reign.

According to Louis Bofferding, a Manhattan antiques dealer, we probably have the French Revolution to thank for the sunburst mirror’s debut. “The revolutionaries stormed, shuttered, even destroyed monasteries, convents and churches. Among the loot of the rabble were the gilded aureoles of celestial rays that had haloed representations of the Holy Family and saints on altars,” Mr. Bofferding said. “It didn’t take long for enterprising antiques dealers and collectors to buy those vacant sunbursts for a song, slip mirrors into the cavities and launch what would become a vogue in the 20th century.”

By 1940, the great French metalworker Gilbert Poillerat forged and gilded sunburst mirrors that smacked more of café society than the celestial realm. Soon, Parisian artisan Line Vautrin made sunburst mirror frames out of plastic—a technological innovation of her own day—never imagining that they would become an auction-world juggernaut at the turn of the 21st century.

And when bidders at Sotheby’s and Christie’s go wild for something, you know Crate & Barrel, Target and Pier 1 Imports can’t be far behind. Victoria Hagan, New York decorator to uptown clients, said she finds “sunburst mirrors add a happy touch, a sparkle, to any space, from the tiniest of powder rooms to the grandest of living rooms. I use them in unexpected ways, hanging them over another mirror, or above a piece of art in a small space, like a vestibule.” Meanwhile, downtown decorator Miles Redd, who caters to the haute bohème set, said, “They can dress up a boring space. They bring a sense of architecture and reflective surface to a room. I love them hanging above a headboard on a canopy bed.”

Said interior designer Thom Filicia, “I’ve hung them over fireplaces, where they pick up and play with the flames.”

The sunburst mirror has always fallen somewhere between decoration and art: from midcentury decorator Tony Duquette’s readymade-like versions created with automobile hubcaps to a recent Jonathan Adler design that used vintage Barbie dolls to create the sunburst motif. And so, it would seem, whether old or new, expensive or cheap, high- or low-brow, the sunburst mirror, in one form or another, will always be with us.

—Steve GarbarinoPrinted in The Wall Street Journal, page D5

Italian villa-style home in Los Angeles lists for $30 million. 2) A Nevada ranch goes on the market for $29.6 million. 3) A Sydney, Australia, waterfront estate asks $57.5 million. John Edwards has details on The News Hub.(Photo: Don Lewis)

The estate of W. Howard Lester, the late chairman and chief executive of Williams-Sonoma, has put his Italian villa-style home in Los Angeles’s Holmby Hills neighborhood on the market for $30 million, according to Mauricio Umansky, the listing agent and the founder and CEO of real-estate firm the Agency.

The roughly 20,000-square-foot home has seven bedrooms and 13 bathrooms along with a home theater, a library, a wine cellar and a billiards room. The home theater has a barrel-vaulted, gold-leafed ceiling. There’s also a guesthouse on the 1.4-acre property, accessible via an arched brick bridge. There’s also a waterfall, fountains, a pool and a rose garden. The home is a few doors down from the Manor, the mansion racing heiress Petra Ecclestone bought last year for $85 million.

Mr. Lester, who bought Williams-Sonoma in 1978, died in 2010. He and his wife, Mary, bought the property in 2004 for $17.5 million through the Lester Family Trust. After the purchase, they embarked on a major renovation of the home, adding the movie-theater room, the wine cellar and the billiards room downstairs.

A Nevada Ranch Goes on the Market for $29.6 Million

A 740,000-acre ranch in Ely, Nev., has gone on the market for $29.6 million. The ranch, about three hours north of Las Vegas, is owned by oil industrialist Gary Sprouse, who sold the oil company he owned with several partners for $135 million in 1978.

Called Blue Diamond Ranch, the property has one main residence—a 3,000-square-foot, three-bedroom log cabin. There’s also an office building for ranch operations, a warehouse for ranch equipment, a horse barn and corrals and two log homes for ranch staff. The property spans parts of three counties in Nevada.

Mr. Sprouse, 77, says he decided to sell because he’s recovering from open-heart surgery and doesn’t want to maintain a ranch of this size. In 1974, he bought the original parcel of land that composed the ranch, paying $1.6 million for 500,000 acres. He expanded the ranch to its current size by buying more than a dozen adjacent parcels over the next 30 years.

Kristine Volk-Jancsek and Melody Hernandez Quinn of Synergy Sotheby’s International Realty’s farm-and-ranch division in Las Vegas have the listing.

Sydney Waterfront Estate Asks $57.4 Million

The price for a waterfront estate in Sydney has been set at about 55 million Australian dollars, or $57.4 million.

The eight-bedroom home has views across the harbor. The property includes two parcels that could be separated in the future: 15,069 square feet that holds the house and about 11,840 square feet that are vacant. Owners Deke Miskin, a former magazine publisher, and Eve Miskin, a swimwear designer, are selling because they don’t use it enough, says Kevin Whelan with Coldwell Banker Previews International Double Bay.

The property isn’t exclusively listed; other eastern-suburb agents in Sydney who have listed it include Bill Bridges of Ballard Property and Bill Malouf of LJ Hooker Double Bay.

—Lauren A. E. Schuker and Joanne Lee-Young—Email: privateproperties@wsj.com

By ALYSSA ABKOWITZ

Oil executives who made windfalls from the shale booms in Texas are expanding their real estate empires, buying residential properties in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and ranches out west. PHoto: Allison V. Smith for The Wall Street Journal.

The shale-oil boom in the Lone Star State has created a different kind of gusher: oil executives flush with cash looking to buy luxury real estate.

“We can list a house and in two hours have an offer,” says Beth Ferester, a real-estate agent in Houston. Some high-end homes in the city have sold for as much as 10% over the asking price, says Lisa Kornhauser, a local agent with John Daugherty Realtors.

Modern-day moguls aren’t always looking for glitzy homes that boast their wealth, real-estate agents say. Instead, location and the home’s layout are important, along with sleek, understated design and ample outdoor entertainment space. Mark Molthan, a builder in Dallas, says many energy executives like subterranean garages that can hold a dozen cars, elevators and cisterns to ensure they always have water to be able to irrigate their yards.

He recently finished a home for an oil executive that included a 1,000-square-foot trophy room for the exotic animals he’d shot in Africa. “It was like walking into a museum,” Mr. Molthan says.

Many oil executives are looking for a spread where they can entertain. Popular amenities include large media rooms, wine cellars and trophy rooms for the avid outdoorsman. Barry Williams, an interior designer in Dallas, completed a $6 million home in the Preston Hollow neighborhood for an oil executive several years ago that included a media room featuring 20 of the owner’s collection of stuffed game animals. Bob Simpson, founder of XTO Energy, which Exxon Mobil

took over in 2010, recently added about 5,000 square feet onto his nearly 14,000-square-foot Fort Worth home, adding an indoor pool and a sports court.

In Houston, where the median sale price is $172,000, sales of homes for $1 million or more jumped 24% last year compared with 2011, according to the Houston Association of Realtors. In San Antonio, where the median sale price is $156,900, sales of homes priced at $500,000 or more jumped 12% from 2011 to 2012, according to the San Antonio Board of Realtors. In Dallas, sales of homes in the $1 million-and-above range increased 10% in March, year over year.

Rick Pfeiffer, a 58-year-old CEO of an oil-field equipment-services company, has lived in Mumbai, Singapore and Darien, Conn. But these days, he’s house hunting in San Antonio, the biggest city near the booming Eagle Ford Shale formation, a prime location for hydraulic fracturing. The drilling technique, which uses sand, water and chemicals under high pressure to extract oil and natural gas from rock formations, has helped Eagle Ford oil production grow by 184% last year compared with 2011, according to the Railroad Commission of Texas, which regulates the state’s oil and gas exploration and production.

Mr. Pfeiffer is currently renting a condo in the Alamo Heights neighborhood, a high-end area located 5 miles from downtown. Agent Ellen McDonough is helping him and his wife look for a home in the $750,000-to-$1.5 million range with a swimming pool. The Pfeiffers are also looking in Olmos Park, Monte Vista and Terrell Hills, where Craig Rosenstein, president of Lewis Energy Group, recently listed his home for $1.92 million. Prices in those neighborhoods range anywhere from $217,500 for a three-bedroom, two-bathroom home under 2,000 square feet to $6.95 million for a 14,000-square-foot, six-bedroom, nine-bathroom estate.

Like Mr. Pfeiffer, many people connected to the shale and natural-gas industry are relocating to major cities in Texas. Exxon Mobil, for example, is building a new campus in Houston for employees, including hundreds who are relocating from its Virginia and Ohio offices, and Devon Energy

has opened an office in Abilene, Texas, to be closer to the nearby Cline Shale formation. Others are moving to the Dallas-Fort Worth area, where the Barnett Shale formation, which produces in 24 counties, accounted for 31% of well-gas production in Texas last year, according to the railroad commission.

Marcus Rowland, who recently retired as CEO of a drilling outfit, for example, relocated from Oklahoma and in 2011 bought a more than 8,000-square-foot, five-bedroom, five-bathroom Mediterranean spread, complete with an entertainment room and a pool, in Fort Worth’s gated community of Montserrat. The neighborhood has 220 homes that range from $1 million to $10 million.

“So many companies have moved their headquarters here or increased their presence,” says John Zimmerman, a local agent near Fort Worth who has worked with oil executives. Robbie Briggs, owner of Briggs Freeman Sotheby’s International Realty in Dallas, estimates that 50% of his firm’s buyers are connected to the shale boom. They include oil executives, attorneys, technology consultants, midstream-company managers and accountants.

Oil man Trevor Rees-Jones, who netted billions drilling in the Barnett Shale, has been buying up several properties in the University Park neighborhood of Dallas, according to public records. In the summer of 2011, he purchased two vacant half-acre lots with large oak trees that overlook the Dallas Country Club golf course. Then, in late 2012, he bought a third property nearby—a 1.47-acre lot—and tore down an existing 8,343-square-foot, four-bedroom, six-bathroom, two-half-bath home. According to appraisal reports, the total market value of Mr. Rees-Jones’s vacant lots is more than $3 million; he bought the property with the existing home for $8 million. Mr. Rees-Jones declined to comment; local real-estate agents say he plans to build on one of the lots and to hold the two lots near the golf course as investments.

In Houston, Jeffrey Sheets, Alan Hirshberg and Don Wallette, all senior executives at ConocoPhillips,

have purchased new homes over the past two years. Mr. Hirshberg bought a home in the tony area of Piney Point Village for $3.68 million in June 2011, according to public records. In May 2012, Mr. Wallette purchased a home in Hunters Creek Village for $1.25 million, and two months later, Mr. Sheets, the company’s chief financial officer, bought a 7,177-square-foot home with a list price of $3.2 million from a former Houston Astros executive. Through a spokesman, all three executives declined to comment.

According to public records, Mr. Hirshberg’s 11,374-square-foot home has two elevators and a pool, and Mr. Wallette’s Spanish-style home, which was built in 2009, has marble countertops and an outdoor kitchen and bar. Mr. Sheets’s home includes a game room, a pool and hot tub, and a patio with a built-in grill.

New construction has also benefited from the boom. From February 2012 to February 2013, single-family building permits rose nearly 30% in Houston, 18% in Dallas and 2% in San Antonio, according to the National Association of Home Builders. Sharon Ballas, an agent in Houston, says many spec homes are selling “at the Sheetrock stage” that buyers then customize to their tastes.

David Nichols, a real-estate agent in Dallas, says many residents tear down older homes in choice locations because finding a vacant lot in upscale neighborhoods can be difficult. Indeed, on a recent morning in Highland Park, the drone of construction trucks and workers could be heard along the streets lined with Tudor and French-style mansions. Many trucks made it difficult for Mr. Nichols to see past them as he inched his green Mercedes out into traffic.

Shale barons aren’t just looking at residential real estate. Many of them also are buying land.

Energy Transfer Partners

CEO Kelcy Warren kicked off a ranch-buying spree when he bought the Boot Jack Ranch in southwest Colorado for $46.5 million in 2010, says Eric O’Keefe, editor of the Land Report, a quarterly magazine about landowners and their properties. Originally listed at $88 million, the 3,151-acre property included a 13,825-square-foot main residence, four guest log cabins and ample water rights. Mr. Warren declined to comment.

In the past two years, Cisco, Texas-based brothers Farris and Dan Wilks have been buying up almost 200,000 acres in ranchland. The Wilks brothers founded Frac Tech, a company that performs services to increase oil-well productivity, and sold it for $3.5 billion to Singapore’s Temasek Holdings in 2011. Their most notable ranch buy was Montana’s 62,000-acre N Bar Ranch, listed for $45 million, which they bought from software entrepreneur Tom Siebel in January 2011. Tim Murphy, a broker at Hall and Hall whose firm has worked with the Wilks brothers, says they continue to look for more ranchland, not just for future land assets but for recreational purposes, too. “They like to hunt,” he says, “and really are enamored by the thousands of elk, antelope and deer.”

Write to Alyssa Abkowitz at alyssa.abkowitz@wsj.com

A version of this article appeared April 26, 2013, on page M1 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: The New Texas Land Rush.

By JOANNE LEE-YOUNG

Open House

3 Lindsay Ave.

Sydney, Australia

STATS: This 11,302-square-foot, five-bedroom, 3½ bathroom house on 18,567 square feet of land is asking 35 million Australian dollars ($36.4 million) or A$3,096 a square foot, down from A$50 million when it first listed in August 2011. Property taxes in 2012 were about A$12,000, according to the owner.

DETAILS: The owner says he bought this property, which sits on Sydney Harbor, in the early 1960s from the estate of Margaret McAurlach Wirth of Wirth’s Circus, a family troupe that toured in the 1920s, and built the steel-and-glass home. From the upper level, you can see the Sydney skyline and the Sydney Harbor Bridge. When the owner was chief executive of Westinghouse Electric in Australia, this property was known for entertaining many guests; he remembers Lyndon B. Johnson borrowing his rowing scull when he visited. Water facilities include a boat pen for a 100-foot-long vessel, three slipways and a fully equipped workshop with 1,055-gallon diesel and gas tanks for refueling boats. An inclinator, which resembles a glass elevator on a slope, was added so you can ride from the parking level to the swimming pool and lawn on the property’s waterfront area, which is 6,458 square feet and held by a 20-year lease.

SELLER:
William Tyree, CEO and chairman of the Tyree Group of companies and one of Australia’s leading philanthropists.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD: Darling Point is one of Sydney’s grand old suburbs, known for its proximity to the central business district and its estates.

WHAT I PAID: The owner says he paid the equivalent of something just under A$200,000 in the early 1960s. “I bought it in pounds,” he says. Of the millions of dollars he says he has poured into the property over the years since then, Mr. Tyree says: “I have never counted them up.”

WHY I’M SELLING: “I’m 91 years old and I have to realize my position.”

WHAT I’LL MISS: His wife, who died six years ago and was very much involved with the house.

WHAT I WON’T: The size of the property. “Now that I have lost my wife and partner, I will be pleased to move into smaller premises.”

COMP: Across the bay, a modern, five-bedroom, seven-bathroom waterfront home on Point Piper, also with extensive views, is asking A$40 million.

OTHERS SAY: “It’s in a great location,” says Michael Pallier of Sydney Sotheby’s International Realty. He thinks the initial pricing may have been “ambitious” and the new one is more in line. “It’s not a brand-new house.” Ken Jacobs of Christie’s International Real Estate in Sydney has the listing.

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page D7A

By ELIOT BROWN

Blackstone Group LP

wants to dive deeper into commercial-property lending.

The private-equity giant is looking to bulk up Capital Trust Inc.,

a publicly traded commercial-mortgage lender it took control of late last year, becoming the latest entrant into the growing field of nonbank commercial-mortgage lenders.

Last month, Capital Trust, which was built up by real-estate investor Sam Zell before it was hobbled in the real-estate bust, filed plans with the Securities and Exchange Commission to raise $100 million in equity.

“Our business plan is to create the premier global commercial real-estate lending platform,” Capital Trust said in the SEC filing.

Total commercial real-estate debt in the U.S. rose for the first time in four years during the fourth quarter of 2012, climbing $23 billion to a total of $3.06 trillion, according to loan-research service Trepp LLC. But many traditional lenders such as banks and life insurance companies are only gradually returning to the trade.

With once-active players such as Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. no longer around, some private-equity funds and commercial mortgage real-estate investment trusts have sought to fill the void. Starwood Property Trust Inc.,

a mortgage REIT formed in 2009, has grown rapidly to hold more than $3 billion of loans at the end of the fourth quarter.

On Monday, Starwood Property announced plans to raise more than $720 million in a stock offering. Other active lenders in the space include private-equity fund H/2 Capital Partners LLC and Ladder Capital Finance Holdings LLLP.

These companies tend to focus on riskier loans such as construction projects and buildings with high vacancy that banks still shun. Depending on their risk, these loans can carry interest rates two or three percentage points higher than standard loans.

“The true commercial banks—they’ve pretty much kept their discipline,” said Howard Michaels, chairman of real-estate finance advisory firm Carlton Group.

In its SEC filing, Capital Trust said the “retrenchment” of the banks and their relatively conservative lending practices today “have created a large scale opportunity” to make commercial-real-estate loans.

In addition, nontraditional lenders make loans faster and offer more debt on a given property than a typical bank.

Last fall, developer Steven Witkoff needed a construction loan quickly for a retail development in Times Square. He turned to a group led by Starwood Property for a $475 million commitment because the company could move fast and offered a larger loan than traditional banks. “I closed that deal in three weeks,” Mr. Witkoff said. “It wasn’t even a question—there was no possibility of going to the banks.”

Such lending is riskier than making loans on more-stable properties. That makes companies such as Capital Trust and Starwood Property more vulnerable should real-estate values fall.

During the economic downturn, many commercial-mortgage REITs were hit hard. Among them was Capital Trust, making it a rare black eye in real estate for Mr. Zell, known as an adept opportunistic investor.

The company, which focused on high-yielding loans, saw its share price tumble to less than $2 a share in 2009 from more than $50 a share in early 2007. Since then, it has generally hovered between $2 and $4 a share. In New York Stock Exchange trading Tuesday, Capital Trust closed at $2.59, up two cents.

“We made our share of mistakes and simply did not foresee the ferocity of the storm that was approaching,” John Klopp, the company’s former chief executive, said on an investor call in late 2009, according to a transcript.

In December, Blackstone paid a total of $31.4 million to buy a 17.1% stake in Capital Trust and to gain control the management company that runs Capital Trust, among other assets. While the private-equity fund previously had been active in offering junior debt to borrowers, the acquisition gave it a platform to make mortgages.

Timing for the stock offering—which is being led by Citigroup Inc.,

Bank of America Corp.

and J.P. Morgan Chase

& Co.—is unclear. Capital Trust said in its filing it also is in talks with multiple financial firms that would provide the company with a credit facility.

Such lending is riskier than loans on more-stable properties. That makes companies such as Capital Trust and Starwood Property more vulnerable should real-estate values fall.

Write to Eliot Brown at eliot.brown@wsj.com

A version of this article appeared April 10, 2013, on page C8 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Blackstone Boosts Lender.