Source: The Wall Street Journal
Represented by: Liz Hogan
The only available home on Miami’s Star Island—a mecca for celebrities, CEOs and the global rich—is listing for $54 million.
The waterfront estate is the former home of comedian Rosie O’Donnell, who bought it in 1999 for $6.75 million. O’Donnell sold the estate for $16.5 million in 2003 to Dr. David Frankel, a doctor and real-estate investor, and his wife Linda Frankel, a former fashion editor at Vogue and the sister of the journalist Diane Sawyer. Linda died in 2023 and David in March 2024, according to their son, attorney and former music executive Greg Frankel, who is currently living on the property with his family.
The roughly 1-acre property totals about 11,000 square feet across an eight-bedroom, Mediterranean main house and two guesthouses, according to listing agent Liz Hogan of Compass. There is a large pool with a slide and a boathouse, where the Frankels stored water sports equipment and gear. There is also a private dock and a 40,000-pound boat lift.
The estate was originally built in the 1920s. Before O’Donnell, the Star Island property was occupied by a marijuana-smoking religious organization known as the
Ethiopian Zion Coptic Church. In the 1970s, neighbors complained about the smell of dense marijuana smoke on the island.
When O’Donnell owned the house, she famously had a mounted hammerhead shark suspended above the staircase, according to Greg Frankel. The Frankels replaced the shark with a contemporary art piece, he said with a laugh.
At the home’s front entrance, a massive banyan tree forms the centerpiece of a motor court. The main house has a bar, a rooftop terrace and a workshop. The Frankels substantially renovated the home, opening up the entryway, redoing the kitchen and rethinking the landscaping, their son said. Linda, a botany enthusiast, particularly enjoyed tending to a small mango grove on the property. “They were a big treat for everybody when they came in in the spring,” he said.
Greg and his family have been living at the property for the last 18 months while they renovate their own home in Coconut Grove, he said. His children enjoy the waterslide in the backyard and catching lobsters off the back wall of the property. They scoot around the gated island on Go Karts and electric scooters. “It’s like their own little racetrack,” he said.
The family didn’t consider moving into the Star Island house permanently because they had already put so much effort into renovating their other property, which is closer to the children’s school, he said.
Greg said the property has been well maintained, but he doesn’t rule out the possibility that a new owner may want to tear it down. All over the island, wealthy buyers have torn down older homes to make way for bigger, more extravagant mansions. Another Star Island owner, dental products entrepreneur John Jansheski, moved an older house on his lot to the far side of the property to make way for a new house, for instance. “You don’t know what to think anymore at this level,” Greg said.
With its guarded gate and secluded location, Star Island has long drawn high-profile people, including Gloria Estefan and former NBA star Shaquille O’Neal. More recently, billionaire hedge funder Ken Griffin purchased numerous contiguous lots on the island.
Hogan said the Miami-area luxury market has been extremely active in recent months. Among recent deals, a nearby La Gorce island property sold for $100 million, and David and Victoria Beckham closed on a Miami Beach home for $72.25 million.
