Millionaire Suffers From Oversized-Home Syndrome

Schmitt Home A column in the Palm Beach Post by Jose Lambiet describes the rather bizarre predicament of Dru Schmitt, a multi-millionaire who made his money in medical data.

Mr. Schmitt sold his St. Louis-based company in 2005 for $260 million. On the same day that he sold the company he bought three prime pieces of land near Boca Raton, Fla., and promptly ordered up a mansion befitting a newly minted millionaire. The 23,000 square-foot mansion is done in French-Country-Manor-style (this being the Florida beach), with four kinds of rare onyx in the bedroom, music piped underwater in the resort-style pool, a computerized television system holding 850 movies and hand-shaved walnut floors. The doorknobs and hinges alone cost $160,000.

Yet when Dru and his wife and kids moved in, they discovered a problem. It was too big. So days after moving in, they put it on the market.

Theyre from the Midwest, Gerard Liguori, the homes broker, told me. When they moved it they felt it was just too large for what they were comfortable with.

OK, its easy to make fun of the Schmitts for building a house thats too big. And who knows whether size is the real reason or whether there are other financial factors at work (Mr. Liguori insists its size).

But the fact is, until youve actually lived in a 23,000 square-foot home, you dont know whether youll like it. Like Larry Ellison and his famously oversized boat, the Schmitts designed their dream, filled it with their favorite stuff, then realized it all looked better on paper. Since so much of todays wealth is instant, Id guess that oversized-home syndrome isnt going to be unique to the Schmitts.

For more photos, including one of the biggest bathrooms I’ve ever seen, click here.