The size of the record is worth stating precisely. The previous high listings in the county were a $23 million Westlake lot and a $22 million Fort Worth house designed by architect I.M. Pei, the Dallas Morning News reported. By this piece’s arithmetic, the new ask tops the previous highest listing of any kind by about $4.75 million and the highest-priced house listing by about $5.75 million; The Real Deal puts the margin at roughly $5 million. It is also an asking price, not a sale price. Nothing has traded, no offer has been reported, and the “record” claim originates with the listing brokerage, Ebby Halliday’s Marcontell + Gilchrest Group, which has an obvious interest in the framing. “The mansion is an immediate masterpiece,” said Susan Gilchrest, one of the two listing agents, who is not a disinterested observer.
The ownership trail adds some texture. The owner is developer Rashid Salem, who bought the property in 2020, according to Tarrant County records cited by Fort Worth Magazine; it was originally owned by Terry Horton, who has led D.R. Horton’s Dallas-Fort Worth division since 1981. The house was built in 2009 and redesigned over four years by owners who originally planned to live there. Listing agent Kelly Marcontell told Fort Worth Magazine that a home with this level of finish, with rift-cut oak, poplar and Italian marble on nearly every surface, takes at least three to four years to complete. Salem’s firm is named differently across coverage: Strata Development in the Dallas Morning News and The Real Deal, Petra Development in Fort Worth Magazine. The excerpts reviewed don’t resolve that. The Tarrant Appraisal District values the property at $6.1 million for tax purposes, so the asking price is about 4.5 times the appraisal. The reports don’t explain the gap or date the appraisal. Appraisal values commonly trail both renovations and market pricing, which may account for some of it, but that is a general observation, not something the reporting establishes here…