The $200 Million Apartment

More evidence that house prices are moving towards a power-law distribution, with the expensive stuff becoming insanely expensive:

Sheikh Hamad, the Foreign Minister of Qatar, recently paid $195 million for a 20,000-square-foot penthouse at One Hyde Park in London.
Put down your calculator. That's $9,800 per square foot.

The Independent has more details on developers Nick and Christian Candy:

Before these penthouses went on the market, it was assumed that the upper price limit for any London home - however luxurious - was £2,000 per square foot. The Candy brothers made £4,000 per square foot their starting price.

It's also worth noting that even after spending $195 million for his flat, Sheikh Hamad – and the owners of two other penthouses which are also rumored to have gone for £100 million apiece – still won't be able to move in until 2009 at the earliest.

London, of course, is even more of a global city than New York, and as someone who hasn't lived in London for 10 years I view these developments with a mixture of pride and incomprehension. I remember the area in question as being posh, to be sure, but in a slightly shabby way: this was back when the hotel next door, today the Mandarin Oriental, was simply the Hyde Park Hotel. Now, it seems, there's nowhere on the planet more upscale.