Michael Phelps Flipping in Fells Point

SELLER: Michael Phelps
LOCATION: Baltimore, MD
PRICE: somewhere between $1,075,000 and $1,475,000
SIZE: 4,080 square feet, bedrooms, 3 full and 2 half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: A week or so ago we received a covert communique from an industrious young man we'll call Balamer O. Riole who alerted Your Mama that record breaking Olympic super-swimmer Michael Phelps had quietly made his mini-mansion-sized waterfront condominium in Baltimore, MD available for purchase with an unspecified asking price.

No offense to anyone intended, especially to Mister Riole who did most of our property record legwork for us, but Your Mama promptly forgot the matter until yesterday when we stumbled across of a 2009 photograph of a handle-bar mustachioed Mister Phelps and wondered aloud, "Well, who's that daddy?"

Anyone who knows Your Mama knows—in the main—we know as much about sports as we do about astrophysics, which isn't much more than knowing how to spell the words. We do know, however, a thing or two about Michael Phelps, the long and lithe Baltimore Bullet who rose to athletic fame during the 2004 Summer Olympic Games in Athens—that's Athens Greece, puppies, not Athens, GA—when he stroked his way to six gold and two bronze metals. In 2008 the 6-foot 4-inch aquatic phenom launched into international super stardom when he took home 8 more gold medals from the XXIX Olympiad in Beijing. That's in China, dolls.

Property records show the still competing and oft-winning ambi-stroker—who plans to snag a few more medals from the upcoming 2012 Olympics in London—scooped up his four-floor townhouse in October 2007 for $1,699,900. The townhouse, one of a dozen or so similar (or maybe even identical) townhouses in a semi-separate enclave of a large residential apartment complex called The Crescent at Fells Point, sits directly on a quiet finger of Baltimore's busy harbor in the historic and charming Fells Point neighborhood.

As far as we can surmise, the red brick, steel and glass contemporary condo isn't on the open market but—as of today—a listing does indeed appear on the website of a local real estate agent who Mister Riole described as the "indisputable...doyenne of Maryland's most expensive real estate."

The asking price for Mister Phelps' condo shows as by request only on the agent's website where the listing sits between a pair of properties listed at $1,075,000 and $1,475,000 respectively. Common real estate sense tells Your Mama this placement puts the asking price of Mister Phelps' Fells Point pad somewhere between those two amounts. Of course, we could be absolutely, dead wrong.

Should our entirely unscientific and possibly inaccurate assessment of Mister Phelps' asking price be at all on point—and we really can't stress enough that we could be wrong as a chicken wearing lipstick—it would appear that Mister Phelps is prepared to lose a couple to several hundred thousand dollars on the sale of his big ol' Bawlamore bachelor pad.

Listing information is somewhat slender but does indicate there's a two-car ground floor garage and a total of 3 bedrooms and 3 full and 2 half bathrooms spread throughout the suburban house-sized, townhouse-type residence that property records peg at 4,080 square feet.

 A zig-zagging wood and steel staircase winds geometrically from top to bottom and connects all flour floors (plus roof top terrace) of the vertical living space that does not—as far as we know or can surmise from the limited listing information—have an elevator rendering it a pretty negligible option for the glutially weak and/or lazy.

Honey-colored hardwood floors stretch throughout the loft-like main level living/dining area that includes an awkward two-sided fireplace with some sort of too-pedestrian flecked granite surround and a tee-vee nook with curving back wall tiled floor-to-ceiling with a bold and completely unexpected mottled orange tile. A commercial style glass door opens to a small balcony that overlooks a landscaped promenade and bustling marina.

The hardwood floors—regrettably by our meaningless opinion—turn to some sort of (probably expensive) tile in the eat in kitchen that adjoins the dining area. A large center island has a cook top with grill and breakfast bar. The raised panel cabinets are of unknown material that looks like mahogany, the counter tops granite and the appliances perfectly acceptable mid-grade stainless steel.

A built-in housekeeping desk set into a window-lined bay hangs over the driveway with a fairly up close view of the adjacent apartment building and the breakfast area has a wide, floor-to-ceiling window with oblique and obstructed views of the harbor.

In addition to the two guest/family/flexi-use bedrooms listing information indicates there's a "luxe master suite with spa bath," which we're guessing is the one shown in listing photos with an over-sized oval soaking tub, frosted glass shower and crapper enclosures, and granite-topped sink and vanity spaces.

The gravity defying staircase ascends to a small roof top pavilion that gives access to a tiled, wrap-around roof terrace with easy-maintenance planter boxes, panoramic marina, harbor and city views and, it appears in listing photos, a hot tub that may or may not be visible to one or more neighbors.

Naturally Your Mama hasn't a clue why Mister Phelps would be willing to sell his townhouse at what would appear to be a significant loss but our tattletale Mister Riole told us that word on the suburban Baltimore real estate street is Mister Phelps has a been known to house hunt in Baltimore's upscale suburbs and—again according to Mister Riole—showed some interest last summer in this massive, nearly all-glass mansion on its own private peninsula in Pasadena, MD. T

Mister Riole also suggested Mister Phelps might reasonably like to relocate to the ritzy Ritz-Carlton Residences on Baltimore's Inner Harbor where his mother Debbie recently acquired a two bedroom garden apartment described as glitzy and dramatic and sitting so close to the harbor, "its easy waves could almost lap up onto her patio."

listing photos: Krauss Real Property Brokerage