Ooh la lah!
The French government is in contract to sell its ambassador’s residence at 740 Park Ave., the city’s poshest address, for $70 million — $22 million above its $48 million asking price.
The buyer is hedge funder Israel Englander, who bought the pad as a pied a terre for his kids, Paris Match reported.
The deal is a tie for the city’s most expensive co-op sale, on par with Egyptian billionaire Nassef Sawiris’s recent $70 million purchase of a 960 Fifth Ave. penthouse that was owned by the late Edgar Bronfman.
“These billionaires have so much wealth that they will fight for what they want. If they can spend $142 million on a painting, then $70 million for a trophy apartment doesn’t seem like that much. It’s such a small percent of their overall wealth,” a high-end broker who represents billionaires told The Post.
The French government bought the apartment for $600,000 in 1979 but is now too broke to keep it.
Brokers familiar with the sale said that there were many bidders — even though the French government’s sale stipulations were “over-the-top” — like making the potential buyer agree to a price and no changes to the contract when they first submit their bid, and to letting the ambassador stay in the apartment for a time after the deal was signed and even closed.
The ambassador is moving to another fancy but less expensive building, at River House, at 435 East 52nd, where Henry Kissinger and Uma Thurman live.