Greetings from Kennebunkport, Maine. This is where we all gathered the day after our destination wedding: the beach house, Drakes Island, Maine. Wedding ceremony  and reception were perfect — more than perfect, actually, at Kennebunkport’s breath-taking Breakwater Inn and Spa,  on Saturday. Earlier in the day, the breeze had picked up, and though it was 75 degrees outside, I was freezing and drinking hot tea at three pm.  We turned on the exterior heaters but at about 4:50, the wind calmed and settled for the next hour. It was as if God had turned off the fan. Perfect timing. After a long, fun and quite eventful night…  we gathered at the beach house for lunch and beach walks on Sunday before everyone headed out. The gathering made me realize, more than ever, how important homes are in our lives, how they anchor us to family, memories and friends. Here we are, saying goodbye to my daughter and brand new son-in-law as they depart for their honeymoon, on the porch of the beach house where two generations have done the exact same thing. Homes: way more than bricks and mortar.

But where is here? In honor of all the contests we are having — Ten Most Beautiful Women In Dallas — you should vote, these gals are amazing ladies inside and out — and of course, the big cahuna final vote for Best Real Estate Blog In Texas (vote here) — I’m having a mini-Monday morning contest. Tell me the name of this golf course and where it is located, and I MIGHT be able to rustle up an invitation to golf there.

(Transportation not included — both the Lear and the Maserati are in the shop!)

The portion of the gain to be taxed is based on the ratio of non qualified use — the time the property is used as a vacation home or rental unit after 2008 — to the total amount of time you owned the property.Congress has changed the rules so that some of your gain will be taxable if you convert your vacation home or rental unit to a primary residence after 2008. God, how did this one slip by?

“Hi, I hope everyone is well.

This is what has been happening now:

All T.V. and radio stations have been connected to a government broadcast,
they have been doing this throughout the afternoon.  It appears that they
found out that Mel Zelaya’s ex-presidency minister, Enrique Flores Lanza
with a presidential order withdrew in his name, sometime between June 20th
and 28th, Lps. 40,000,000.00 in cash from Honduras’Central Bank’s vault.

The government broadcast is calling for anyone that has received this money
to return it to the public ministry office, and no questions will be asked.
If the money is not returned, they warn that they know the serial numbers on
the notes, and so they will be able to confiscate and detain anyone with it.

It is believed that this money is being used to buy support for the ousted
president.  There are several witnesses, they say that the money was taken
in bags in a wheelbarrow.

My comment here is that it is very evident that all of these followers are
in this for something.  They are not democratic, they all wear red (comunist
color), and are walking around with sticks, pipes and rocks.  Some even
cover their faces.  -These people do not represent the people of honduras
that Mel Zelaya talks about over and over.  He makes it sound like everyone
here is suffering because he is gone, and that the military is oppresing the
people.  That is a true lie.  The only reason why the military have to be
called is because Mel’s band of thugs is walking around the streets with
sticks, pipes, and rocks dressed in comunist colors.

I compare Mel’s pals to Hitler’s buddies, they are tight friends that are
still around here causing trouble, and added to this, the fact that Chavez
and his boys are also coaching the operation. 

I think that the U.S. intervention or non-intervention will be the
determining factor.  I do not know if they want to get involved.  So far
they keep insisting that they will not listen to an illegal government, they
do not see (or do not want to see) that this “illegal government” is
stopping comunism and setting an example. They are even helping Zelaya’s
family.

Please remember that as the U.S. stays quiet, Chavez, his buddies, and Mel
and his friends the crooks, are working hard to make this heroic effort
fail, and it is a shame.

I will keep you all posted of everything I can.  Good night, and I am sorry
if I wrote anything that is not in accordance to your belief on the subject.”

Seriously, trying to get financial info together and what do I do, surf the web looking for House Porn! I cannot help myself — look at this virile lake house, just what the Doctor would have ordered for a holiday weekend family get together. (Add a few piles of clothes, dog toys, magazines and mail to this pristine, clean great room!) I am loving the interiors and the exteriors, I am hoping we have a nice bug system installed to keep away those microscopic carnivores. I am loving the square footage of 2431: three bedrooms, two and a half baths so we don’t get too many visitors (and can pack up, leave her while we jet to Europe). Built by an architect, located on Lake Cypress Springs (the Pebble Beach equivalent to Dallas, east of Sulphur Springs) complete with country club, marina, just two hours east of Dallas. We visited friends who are right on the lake this summer in the heat of July and loved those bubbling little cool springs.  Best news of all: $900,000. Perfect for last-minute deductions.

P. O’B Montgomery & Company

“We are looking at doing whatever makes sense,” Phil Montgomery told me today, when asked if the residences would resume construction. “The market has clearly changed.”

Prescott’s Jud Pankey says the garage is complete and open, and construction attention will now focus on the courtyard. This month’s Architectural Digest feature on the hotel and colorful designer, Carleton Varney and his mentor, Dorothy Draper, has generated national interest in the project; Varney is coming back to Dallas in the spring to create more buzz.

If another developer were going to be engaged for this project, the most likely time would be when construction financing is being negotiated, said Pankey by email.

“Phil Montgomery introduced me to Apollo almost ten years ago, and we all try and assist each other when faced with a challenge,” wrote Pankey.

What we are doing, said Montgomery, is fairly routine.

According to sources, Al Coker is no longer handling marketing for The Stoneleigh Heritage Residences; Cynthia Pharr is handling media relations.

Neal contacted me when he read about the Bush home purchase on this blog, and made plans to fly to Dallas and check out the President’s home turf. He asked me if I would spend some time with him, show him the new Bush digs, and Dallas homes in general. If you know anything about me, I jumped at the chance and spent about two delightful hours showing off Dallas homes December 20. His documentary will run January 19, Bush’s last day in office, and we hope to have a link on Dallas Dirt. It will be translated into 30 languages and beamed just about everywhere. I about choked on my peach mango iced tea with Neal this morning at Celebrity Cafe at Preston Royal when I learned of the world dignitaries he’s canvassed for reflections: the Dalai Lama, Hamid Karzie, Jacob Zuma, Desmond Tutu, Sherry Blair, Gordon Brown. He asked producers at all BBC bureaus to tack on questions about the Bush legacy on all interviews with high profile leaders.

His colleague, Justin Webb, BBC Washington correspondent, interviewed former Bush chief of staff Andrew Card. But Neal wanted to come to Dallas to poke Bush roots for himself, kick the tires in Crawford as well as get an inkling of where the President will soon be putting up his boots. Neal spent Sunday in Crawford, then returned to Dallas to interview future Bush neighbors on Daria Place. It’s always fun to interview a journalist, give us a taste of our own poison pen — or in this case, microphone. So I had to ask…

What has been the response from all those world leaders? Mixed, says Neal. He was particularly surprised that even African leaders did not focus on the President’s pouring billions of dollars into Aids research — instead, the first thing that came to every one’s mind: the Iraq war.

“For better or worse,” says Neal, “It seems that’s the first thing he will be remembered for.”

911 happened when he was in office, says Neal, Iraq was a choice — for better or worse. Bush and his supporters claim it’s way too early to judge if Iraq will be his crowned thorn legacy. But being in Dallas helped Neal understand the President has a lot of fiercely loyal friends here immensely proud of the leadership he showed post 9/11 despite the “I” word.

Then I had to gauge his reaction to Dallas real estate as a Brit, home of the world’s priciest real estate. Neal and his wife, a political theorist at the University of London, live in a 50 square meter flat — equivalent to about 500 square feet. In late 2006, as the world real estate market burned “white hot”, Neal and his wife attempted to qualify to buy a bit of London real estate north of the Thames. Like our Trinity River once red lined “good” and inferior neighborhoods, in London the Thames is the dividing line between prime and less choice properties. All Neal and he wife could qualify for north of the Thames was a parking spot in Chelsea.

Not that being north of the Thames insures any greater safety — London is quite the crime-ridden metropolis, regardless of where you live.

“When I am giving someone directions to our flat from the tube, I say we are three muggings south of Elephant and Castle.”

So it was very interesting to stroll this man through Highland Park, show him 3500 Beverly, the corner of Euclid and Highland where everyone thought Bush was building a fortress, meander up Preston Road (”this was where they drove the cattle?”) past Ralph Lauren and settle down the dusty country roads of Preston Hollow.

“Where are the sidewalks?” Neal asked me.

They don’t want them, I explained; it adds to the gentrified ambiance, as if we were about to go on a fox hunt. Oh and if you have one acre in Preston Hollow you can still have a horse — one horse per acre. Which mean yes, the Bushes may have one horse at 10141 Daria Place if they so desire.

Neal felt homes in Dallas were very generous. What I described as a water feature would be a natural park in Britain, he said. Do the British live very differently, I teased?

I don’t think Texans could possibly understand how small places are in London, he replied.

(Most London flats, he explained, are three and four bedroom Victorian homes turned to apartments – we figured the Bushes could get a good ten flats out of Daria Place.)

As for the Bush home, he believes it was a sensible purchase and quite understated compared to the neighboring homes. Dallas, he said, is lovely and loaded with warm, extraordinary people. However, coming from London, staying at the Adolphus, he could not believe how dead downtown Dallas was despite the construction.

“I wanted to go to a regular bookstore, but it was more than two miles away, and then it was a Christian bookstore,” says Neal. No lunch is served downtown after two p.m. because the restaurants are not busy enough to stay open all afternoon — face it: Dallas is not a 24/7 metrapolis like Chicago or New York. Nowhere near yet, anyhow.

“I felt I was a lonely pilgrim walking around.”

Well, nothing like a trip to Preston Hollow, Celebrity Cafe and Borders to get a pilgrim ming fellow journalist settled for his long voyage home. Looking forward to the report, Neal, and safest travels!

Meantime, Tamarack in Idaho is under, while Credit Suisse is fighting to hang onto first lien status with uber-exclusive Yellowstone Club, which is just a mess , bankrupt and smarting from bad press due to the nasty divorce of it’s great-looking founders, Tim Blixeth and his ex (?), Edra. Also pulled in: luxury second home big boys Discovery Land Co. Interim lender CrossHarbor Capital Partners is trumping and may end up owning the joint because Credit Suisse apparently could not cough up enough cash for a debtor-in-possession loan:

“While it is highly unusual for a major lender to be pushed out of the first lien position in a bankruptcy, Credit Suisse may turn out to be too late with its latest plan.”

About this time last year I tried phoning YC to write up  properties as Hot Props in D Home — they acted as if I needed a security clearance and was trying to find the president’s war-time bunker. We ended up in Big Sky.

But Dallas Addison, who develops second home properties in east and south central Texas, as well as Hawaii, tells me the second home market is still pretty strong. (Posting his story soon: Dallas tells me that Hawaii’s Big Island gets so crowded with residents’ private jets they have to haul them off to other islands for parking.) Glad to hear it: I haven’t been on a Lear in forever.

But alas, unless I sold a few dozen of my own eggs and an ovary or two, a $1.5 mil second home condo is not in the cards. That’s why I am fascinated by the option of Fractional Ownership, which would net me 21 days per year at the Ritz-Carlton Club and Residences, SF, plus the ability to exchange with other Ritz-Carlton properties around the globe.

A fractional ownership is a deeded title/ownership to a property for a certain percentage of time use in the property. Don’t confuse with timeshare ownership — fractional ownership has fewer owners, better resale rates and appreciation, says Daniel G. Morton, Founder and CEO of Fractional Retreats, L.L.C. At The Ritz-Carlton Club SF, a 1/12th one-bedroom Club Residence fractional sells for $239,000. You own the right to 4 weeks out of the year in that unit. (That’s $239,000 versus $1.5 million for total ownership of the same size unit.) The home is about 1300 square feet, comes with a gourmet loaded kitchen despite the fact you’ll probably only eat your morning yogurt in there, dining area, laundry closet, two baths, and living room which could accommodate two overnight guests. The master bath is huge and Ritz-luxurious, oceans of white carrera marble, soaking tub, separate shower, discreet potty. Acres of closet space. Of course the condos come fully furnished with Silicon Valley spoils such as entertainment center, at least two flat screen TVs, all the stereo and DVD gadgets, and special soundproofing so you won’t hear your neighbors. If it’s a larger unit you want, the three-bedroom residence can be yours for $399,000 for almost 4 weeks a year.

Not kidding.

As if the residences themselves are not perfect, the Ritz-Carlton staff is beyond amazing. They will fetch you from the airport in a beautiful BMW limo, email you for food preferences so your fridge is stocked upon your arrival, and greet you at the door every time you enter or leave the building. Need a rental car or nail appointment? Done. It is really like having a personal assistant. Fresh baked cookies fatten you up in the lobby (ask them for a route to run uphill in the city) and if you don’t want to take breakfast in your condo, pop up to the rooftop terrace for a lovely continental breakfast as well as evening cocktails. You can even store items in the building to lighten your luggage schlep.

If you are going to live the jet-setting lifestyle, chances are you’ll be in Dallas, then Santa Fe, then off to Europe for a week or two, then at a beach or ranch somewhere. Go visit some relatives. Then back to home to work. This is my thinking: will I really spend more than 4 weeks a year in one vacation home? Fractional ownership means I will share property-related expenses such as maintenance fees and insurance with other fractional owners. Talk about green, fractional ownership shares resources — how wasteful is it to have a home and let it sit empty week upon week? Why buy the whole cow if you just want a little fillet?

Why, said one skeptic, don’t you just go get a hotel room whenever you want to visit a city and forget this fractional ownership deal? Good point. But I’m getting weird about the beds I sleep in and where I land my tootsies when not in my own self-sanitized baino. As I snooped the halls of this Ritz-Carlton property, I actually saw how compulsively each unit was cleaned between guests: carpets steamed, draperies changed, even the air was exchanged and freshened. We’ve all seen the Sixty Minutes stories on how some maids “clean” hotel rooms — yuck. I take Lysol wipes to the Four Seasons.

Mrs. McDill’s tender story reminded me to remind my family that all I want for Christmas is a fractional ownership at the Ritz-Carlton Club in San Francisco. Many moons from now, they can leave me there to enjoy my final days and… if they are really nice to mama… I may just leave them that deed in my will!