How Donald Trump changed a Palm Beach mansion. The story behind his Mar-a-Lago takeover

Donald Trump bought Mar-a-Lago, his mansion in Palm Beach, more than 30 years before he became president. One of his first moves was to convert it into a club. He now considers it his official residence.

What’s the story behind Trump’s purchase of Mar-a-Lago in 1985 and the changes he has made?

Let’s take a look through the Miami Herald archives.

READ MORE: FBI searches Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home as inquiry into former president intensifies

A deal to make Mar-a-Lago a club

Published June 4, 1993

By David Kidwell

Donald Trump’s troubles with the Palm Beach Town Council appear to be over for now.

After two days of debate over a long list of conditions, the town council voted 4-1 Thursday in favor of the famous deal maker’s plan to convert the swanky Mar-a-Lago estate into a private social club.

“I’m very happy,” Trump said in a telephone interview. “It’s going to be a great addition to the town of Palm Beach. With this approval I’m withdrawing my lawsuit against the town.”

Trump filed a $50 million lawsuit in July after the town council panned Trump’s proposal to subdivide the property.

Thursday’s action ends more than a year of legal battles and name-calling in Trump’s bid to make the 16.4-acre estate profitable. This is the first of Trumps’ ideas the town council hasn’t rejected.

Most of the issues centered on the preservation of the 1926 landmark.

“There’s no question the preservation of this particular edifice and the grounds around it cannot be done as well in any other way,” said Councilwoman Hermine Wiener. “If we’re serious about preservation, this is probably the only route we can go.”

Not so, argues the attorney for the Preservation Foundation, a not-for-profit group that works to preserve the community. The foundation opposes the town council’s decision to allow 10 of the mansion’s 58 bedrooms to be used as guest quarters.

“What they are doing, in effect, is putting a hotel in a residential neighborhood,” said Frank Chopin, the foundation’s attorney. “It’s clearly a violation of the town’s zoning laws.”

But neighbors can take heart that among the conditions are: No helicopter landings, no gambling, no animal circuses.

Membership is limited to 500, of which only 313 can pass through the front gate each day for traffic reasons.

Trump’s attorney Paul Rempell said he’s received several checks from town residents who want to reserve membership. “I got one check for $100,000,” he said. “I returned them all.”

Rempell said work to comply with the conditions -- including turning lanes and a fire protection system -- will begin immediately.

“I’m looking to partially open possibly in November,” Trump said.

Mar-a-Lago was built in 1926 by breakfast cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post and is a National Historic Landmark. Donald Trump bought the 75,000-square-foot mansion and its grounds in 1985 for $10 million.

Palm Beach mansion’s legacy in jeopardy

Published Jun 16, 1991

By Beth Dunlop, architecture critic

Mar-a-Lago sits at a bend in the road in Palm Beach, one of the extraordinary houses of America, a breathtaking sight from any vantage point.

It is at once flamboyant and elegant, built of burnished Italian stone and stucco and the world’s largest collection of 15th Century Spanish tile. With its elegant loggias and deep arched windows and 118 remarkable rooms in its magnificent setting, Mar-a-Lago is a masterpiece.

And it is in trouble.

Built between 1923 and 1927 for cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post and her financier husband E.F. Hutton, Mar-a- Lago is a wonder even by storied Palm Beach standards. More than 50,000 American buildings are listed in the National Register of Historic Places, but only a comparative few, 1,500, are official national historic landmarks; Mar-a-Lago is one of just 19 in Florida.

Post gave Mar-a-Lago to the U.S. government when she died at the age of 86 on Sept. 12, 1973. In 1981, the government, claiming it was too expensive to maintain, gave it back to the foundation controlling her estate. In December 1985, developer Donald Trump -- then at the crest of his success -- bought it for $10 million, half of the $20 million asking price. He vowed that he’d bought Mar-a-Lago to live in, not as a money-making venture; of course, he later refinanced it for $12.5 million.

Times change, and now Trump is in dire financial straits. He wants to subdivide Mar-a-Lago’s 16.8 acres at the intersection of Southern Boulevard and South Ocean Boulevard and sell off eight building lots in a development called the “Mansions at Mar-a-Lago.”

The Palm Beach Landmarks Preservation Commission will consider his controversial request on Friday. The subdivision plan is being vigorously contested by the Landmarks Foundation of Palm Beach, as well as a host of other groups, including the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the American Society of Landscape Architects.

Even the National Park Service, the federal agency that monitors National Historic Landmarks, issued a statement of caution about the scheme. “Of particular concern,” wrote Jean Travers, “are the number of new units proposed; their placement in relationship to historic buildings and structures; preservation and maintenance of the historic landscape design and its individual features (such as vistas); and the visibility and appearance of the new construction.”

Last month, Trump’s lawyer and architect made an initial presentation to the commission, arguing that Mar-a-Lago is too big and too expensive to maintain on its own. “The basis of our request,” said attorney Peter Broberg, “is very simply the preservation of Mar-a-Lago.” He suggested that carving up the land would “put the estate in similar light as other houses in Palm Beach . . . five acres, six acres.”

Palm Beach architect Eugene Lawrence termed his plan for Trump as “an enclave, a private neighborhood of houses that relate to Mar-a-Lago . . . a colony that’s separated from the rest of the town.” He stressed that a key feature of his plan was that a vista from the main house to Lake Worth (the name Mar-a-Lago means “ocean to lake”) would be preserved.

The landmarks commission deferred action on the subdivision request, so last week Trump’s lawyer took an appeal to the Palm Beach Town Council asking for speedy action. The council remanded the action to the landmarks commission for further review this Friday.

There’s a precedent in Palm Beach for subdivision. Shortly before Trump bought Mar-a-Lago, a developer got approval to subdivide the land -- but it expired when he didn’t close the deal with the Post Foundation. Today, the political and legal climate isn’t as favorable for development. On Trump’s subdivision request, the landmarks commission is being more cautious -- and rightly so.

This subdivision plan is little more than a clumsy arrangement of lines on paper. Lawrence tried to maintain a “view corridor” from Mar-a-Lago to Lake Worth, between the eight new lots, but that is the only achievement of the plan - and it is a small achievement.

It is, in fact, a plan that lets greed win out over good taste -- of cramming in multimillion-dollar housing plots (and eventually multimillion dollar houses) without regard to architecture, horticulture and history.

Mar-a-Lago was already a National Historic Landmark when Trump bought it, and with it, he became a custodian of history, not just the owner of a lavish house.

In ideal circumstances, it would simply stay as it is, all 16.8 acres intact.

Intact, Mar-a-Lago - house and landscape - is a landmark. Eight new “mansions” certainly would change the terrain. For most of its existence, there were citrus groves and cutting gardens, greenhouses and broad lawns. There is not an up-to-date inventory on the vegetation at Mar-a-Lago, to determine what might be jeopardized in the subdivision.

The subdivision plan would have all the residents of the new enclave enter and exit on South Ocean Boulevard, which puts in jeopardy Mar-a-Lago’s exquisite tiled front gate. The gate is only wide enough for one lane of traffic. A road would run along the periphery of the property leading to the eight new houses. It would be a sorry fate for a property that is on record in the Library of Congress’ roster of historic landmarks with 111 photographs.

Mar-a-Lago was designed by the Palm Beach architect Marion Syms Wyeth, who did the basic plan, and the Viennese-born New York architect Joseph Urban; Post had met Urban through her friends Florenz Ziegfeld (of Follies fame) and Billie Burke. Trained in Vienna during the Secessionist movement, Urban was an architect, illustrator and set designer (for Ziegfeld, among others, including numerous operas). An Austro-Hungarian sculptor, Franz Barwig also worked on Mar-a-Lago’s ornamentation - cast birds and monkeys and cypress carved into ram’s heads, eagles, griffins and parrots.

The mansion was built with three boatloads of Doria stone imported from Genoa and lavishly adorned with nearly 36,000 glazed Spanish tiles bought from the estate of the legendary art collector Mrs. Horace Havemeyer. The black and white marble floor blocks and the 20,000 mission tiles for the roof were found in a Cuban castle. A back terrace is paved with ocean- polished stones that Post found along the beaches of her Long Island hunting preserve; she laid the stones in a pattern she’d seen at the Alhambra in Spain.

In the entrance hall are 10 coats of arms that trace the history of the Merriweather and Post families. One loggia has walls painted with copies of frescoes from the Riccardo-Medici Palace in Florence. The dining room is decorated with canvas panels painted in seascapes adapted from the Chigi Palace in Rome.

Post once brought the entire Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus to Mar-a-Lago; she regularly hosted square dances -- her favorite form of entertainment there. Upstairs, there was a children’s wing, with a suite of rooms done in fanciful style for her daughter, the actress Dina Merrill.

And now comes the very difficult question of how best to save Mar-a-Lago. It’s a tricky and troubling problem. Mar-a-Lago is indeed private property, but it is also a national treasure.

In an ideal world, it would be a museum, run the way Biltmore House is, carefully curated and conserved -- a monument to American enterprise and architectural genius. But the town of Palm Beach, fearing traffic and crowds, has resisted turning any of its great homes into museums. That transformation -- for it is inevitable that at least one or more will be opened to the public -- will fall to a generation hence. The landed aristocracy of Great Britain long ago discovered that to be a way to keep their inheritance intact.

Throughout Europe, the great chateaus and castles have become hotels - carefully conserved and discreetly run, and that, too, might be another option for Mar-a-Lago, with the appropriate security; it would be preferable to losing it.

There might be a way to create a small number of unobtrusive home sites on the south side of the property, along Southern Boulevard, and keep most of Mar-a-Lago safe for the future. But even that is a bad idea -- the lesser among evils. If any new buildings are constructed on the land, they must be done in a way that is respectful of the landscape and of the historic architecture, There should be little sense that anything has been built at all, and in Palm Beach, that’s unlikely.

More likely, and the worst of all evils, would be eight grandiose “Mansions at Mar-a-Lago” with lots of flamboyant references to the original. Lawrence has suggested that the houses could use similar imagery and some of the original cast concrete molds. But in this case, mimicry would be mockery.

Mar-a-Lago must, somehow, be preserved -- as a major work of architecture, as a historic landscape. It all goes together, and it should stay that way.

The best course would simply be to do nothing new at all, but that may be too great a hope. Still, we ought to dream on a bit - and seek the best solution, or several solutions if that’s what it takes to keep Mar-a-Lago safe from irreparable harm.

Sweet deal

Published Nov. 9, 1988

By Christopher Boyd

Donald Trump, whose name is synonymous with artful deals, crafted a minor masterpiece when he bought the 118-room Mar-a- Lago estate in Palm Beach.

Everybody thought the flamboyant New York investor paid $10 million in cash for the huge compound and an adjacent parcel in 1985.

Everybody was wrong.

Trump’s real investment, it turns out, was $2,811.

“People may have thought Donald Trump pulled $10 million out of his sock drawer,” said Gaylord Wood, an attorney to the Palm Beach County property appraiser. “He was a little more clever than that.”

Trump, a billionaire whose autobiography is titled Trump: The Art of the Deal, borrowed plenty. He just never recorded the mortgage at the courthouse. Publicly, it appeared Trump paid cash for the 1927-vintage mansion of cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post.

No law requires the recording of mortgage deeds, although most lenders demand it. For Donald Trump, they made an exception.

Mar-a-Lago itself cost Trump $8 million, which he financed with an $8.5 million loan from Chase Manhattan Bank. The other parcel - oceanfront land next to the manor - cost $2 million. Trump was able to use $500,000 from the estate loan and a $1.5 million mortgage from the seller, Jack C. Massey, to cover the bill.

This fall, Trump paid off the mortgages and again proved what big-time financial acumen is all about: He got a $12 million loan on the property from Boston Safe Deposit & Trust Co, giving him $2 million more to play around with.

Trump takes over Mar-a-Lago

Published: Dec. 29, 1985

By Ellyn Ferguson

Flamboyant millionaire Donald Trump officially became the new owner of the legendary Mar-a-Lago Friday when he closed the sale on the Palm Beach estate of the late Marjorie Merriweather Post.

Trump, developer of the 68-story Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in Manhatten and owner of the New Jersey Generals football team, signed a contract in October to purchase the 118- room mansion.

The closing on Friday ended the Marjorie Merriweather Post Foundation’s efforts to sell Mar-a-Lago. The mansion has been the subject of three failed sales in three years. The Marriott hotel chain, two friends of country singer Tammy Wynette and a Houston land developer all had negotiated to buy the mansion.

“Things went smoothly on the closing,” foundation attorney Doyle Rogers said Saturday. “I think they (foundation officials) were delighted to complete the sale.”

Rogers declined to say how much Trump paid, but speculation earlier this year put the price between $10 million and $15 million. The sale of Mar-a-Lago is expected to rank among the largest private home sales in American history.

In addition to buying Mar-a-Lago, Trump also closed on an oceanside property owned by Jack C. Massey, Rogers said.

Trump could not be reached for comment.

The pink-and-brown mansion, often considered a monument to Roaring 20s ostentation, stretches from Lake Worth to the Atlantic Ocean and contains 58 bedrooms, 33 bathrooms, three bomb shelters, a theater, a ballroom and a nine-hole golf course.

Mar-a-Lago is an eclectic mix of Italian, Spanish, Dutch and Portuguese architectural sytles. Post, heiress to the cereal maker’s fortune, entertained ambassadors and dignitaries at the mansion. For nearly 30 years, she and her several husbands, including E.F. Hutton, were Palm Beach’s social forces.

After Post died in 1973, her family willed Mar-a-Lago to the U.S. Department of the Interior as a retreat for presidents and heads of state. Seven years later, the federal government returned Mar-a-Lago to the Post Foundation because of the $1 million yearly maintenance bill.

For five months this year it looked as though Houston developer Cerf Stanford Ross would be the new Mar-a-Lago owner. He agreed to buy the estate for $14.3 million and planned to subdivide the property into nine lots, but never closed on the deal.

Instead, Ross took his chances on making a quick profit by selling the property to a British businessman who had made an offer on the estate the same day the Ross purchase was announced.

The businessman closed on the property June 25, but never made the necessary downpayment.

The Post Foundation, tired of waiting for action from Ross or the businessman, decided to take new bids.

Trump makes a move for Mar-a-Lago

Published Oct. 11, 1985

By Nick Ravo

Flamboyant millionaire Donald Trump, a New York real estate magnate and owner of the New Jersey Generals football team, has agreed to purchase and use as a private home Mar-a-Lago, the fabled Palm Beach estate of the late Marjorie Merriweather Post.

ources close to the negotiations for the 17-acre property said Thursday that Trump, the developer of the 68-story Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, has signed a contract to purchase the late cereal heiress’ 118-room mansion.

Three attempts to sell the estate to other buyers - the Marriott hotel chain, two friends of country singer Tammy Wynette and a Houston land developer - have failed in the past three years.

The closing date for the deal with Trump likely will be announced later this fall, the sources said. The purchase price will range from $10 million to $15 million, they said.

Trump could not be reached for comment. Officials with the Marjorie Merriweather Post Foundation, the current owner of the mansion, refused to comment except to say “a contract has been signed, and the house is off the market.”

One source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that Trump is expected to use the estate as a private residence. “He plans to maintain a low profile,” the source said. “He won’t have his football team running around up there.”

“That’s mindboggling that someone is going to come in and live there,” Palm Beach Town Council President Paul Ilyinsky said. “But this is what we wanted. This will solve a lot of problems. I’m looking forward to meeting him.”

Often considered a gaudy monument to Roaring ‘20s ostentation, Mar-a-Lago stretches from Lake Worth to the Atlantic Ocean and contains 58 bedrooms, 33 bathrooms, three bomb shelters, a theater, a ballroom and a nine-hole golf course.

The sale will likely be one of the largest private home sales in American history. The largest sale ever was singer Kenny Rogers’ purchase of The Knoll in Beverly Hills in 1984 for $22.5 million.

The same house was sold for $14.5 million in 1981 to film director Dino De Laurentiis. The only other sales in excess of $10 million have been the homes of Conrad Hilton and Bing Crosby. The Wrightsman Estate in Palm Beach sold earlier this year for $10 million.

One of the first attempts to sell Mar-a-Lago came in 1982, but the Marriott Corp. abandoned the idea of turning the estate into a resort. About 18 months ago, William Frederick and Thomas Moye, a pair of high-flying developers with a taste for wild parties and country music, also lost interest in acquiring the property.

What appeared to be the final agreement to sell Mar-a-Lago came in May of this year when Houston developer Cerf Stanford Ross agreed to buy the property for $14.3 million. He planned to subdivide the property into nine lots - but he never sought financing or closed the deal.

Instead, Ross took a chance at making a quick profit by selling the property.

A British businessman - who also intended to live on the property - had made an offer on the same day Ross’ purchase was announced. The businessman closed on the property on June 25 - but never produced the necessary down payment.

So, after waiting five months for either Ross to close the deal on his right to buy the property or for the British businessman to make a down payment to Ross, the Post Foundation decided to accept other bids on the property. The Trump bid, sources said, was both made and accepted this week.

Ross now stands to lose a $250,000 escrow payment and an estimated $1 million in legal and business expenses. “It’s a helluva mess, a sad turn of events,” he said. “If I had known this would happen, I would have gone ahead and gotten financing and subdivided.”

The pink-and-brown Mar-a-Lago mansion was built in 1927 and is filled with an eclectic array of tapestries, sculptures, antiques, bric-a-brac, marble bathtubs, saunas, leopard skins, a two-ton dining table that seats 50 and other one-of-a-kind furnishings.

Designed by Joseph Urban, the man who created the Ziegfeld Follies, the long-revered house combines Italian, Spanish, Dutch and Portuguese architectural styles and was often used as a vacation home for ambassadors and dignitaries.

For nearly 50 years, Post and her various husbands, including E.F. Hutton, reigned as the social lions of Palm Beach. When she died in 1973, her family willed Mar-a-Lago to the U.S. Department of the Interior as a retreat for presidents and heads of state.

The federal government, however, gave it back to the Post Foundation seven years later because of annual cost of maintenance: a mere $1 million