Ripping Out a Hedgie

If ever wanted to know how the new Masters of the Universe live, you had a chance to take a peek inside on Friday and you get another later this month.

The Greenwich, Connecticut, mansion of a former hedge fund manager is being auctioned off by the Internal Revenue Service. An open house was held on Friday; a second will be on September 25.

The house was owned by a hedge fund manager who has been accused by the government as being the master of a much darker universe: Michael Lauer, the founder of the Lancer Group of hedge funds.

Lauer and four associates were indicted earlier this year on charges of defrauding investors of $200 million. The federal indictment, handed up in Miami, accuses Lauer and his associates of manipulating the closing market price of securities of thinly traded shell companies in order to falsely inflate the value of the Lancer Group hedge funds.

Foreclosure on his 7,328-square-foot house at 7 Dwight Lane in "back country" Greenwich is clearly just one of Lauer's problems.

The I.R.S. announcement of the auction notes all the amenities one would expect from Greenwich, a town of 62,000 which as Tom Wolfe described last year in Conde´ Nast Portfolio "has become the Wall Street of hedge funds."

It has three fireplaces, vaulted ceilings, two whirlpool tubs, a wine cellar, four-car attached garage, heated inground outside pool with stone terrace, spa and waterfall, and a tennis court

It may not be much of a bargain: the minimum bid is $2.5 million.

Lauer bought the property in 1999 for $2.3 million, according to the Hartford Courant.

And there may be one minor drawback. The Courant says it appears that "the lawn needs a good trimming."

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