The Vacation House of Pirro

SELLER: Jeanine and Albert Pirro
LOCATION: West Palm Beach, FL
PRICE: $795,000 (taxes: $12,274/year and association dues: $6,624/year)
SIZE: 3,892 square feet, 4 bedroom, 3.5 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: (considerably reduced from listing agent's website)...Private Master suite is graciously appointed with 6-paneled doors, His & Hers fitted walk-in closets with mirrored doors, plus a separate side closet...13 x 10 ft. sitting room off the master bedroom provides a bright room with additional space for reading, your computer needs, or just simply relaxing...Master Bathroom provides two separate room with separate vanities, commode, and dual shower entry...Glass block in master bath maximizes the natural light over the roman tub surrounded by 20" floor tiles and "her" separate vanity with knee space/make-up sitting area.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Here we are down in West Palm Beach checking out the vacation home of Jeanine and Albert Pirro. Once again, because we're dealing with the property of a couple of high-powered attornies, we want to state for the record what you're reading here is our opinon.

As many of you know from our last posting, Your Mama was stupefied and practically speechless regarding the Pirros' puzzling and offensive primary residence up in Westchester County, just North of New York City. And as you might imagine from the photos, Your Mama is no more impressed with their vacation home which is located about eight miles from the ocean in The Breakers West development on Okeechobee Boulevard .

According The Breakers West Realty Corporation website, the development lays claim to a Rees Jones golf course and a relationship with the elegant and famous oceanfront Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach. Your Mama vehemently opposes living in housing developments like this Breakers West place, but by all accounts, the development is meant to be high class, hunny. We're not convinced.

In addition to the astronomical quarterly maintenance ($1,656/quarter in the case of the Pirro property), owners can purchase several additional memberships which allow them access to various high-priced amenities. For example, an "Ocean Membership" entitles you to such luxuries as complimentary access to the beach and pools at The Breakers Beach Club, complimentary greens fees and tennis court time, and of course, complimentary parking at the clubs. All this for the bargain price of $12,000 per year with a required membership deposit of $125,000. Your Mama does not know if the Pirros have enhanced their vacation lifestyle with any of the additional memberships, but we suspect they have. Just call it a hunch.

Anyhoo, the sheer decorative spectacle of the Pirros' Harrison house has, oddly enough, been replaced by an aggressive banality at their Florida hideaway. As we scanned the photographs, it took a few moments before we realized this property is indeed just as distressing as their Harrison house and there are a few items we'd like to point out that Your Mama finds in particularly bad taste.

Number One: The carpet. Little upsets Your Mama more than seeing acres of beige carpeting. This crime, made worse by it's being laid up in a damned tract house, is inexcusable in the home of a rich person, even if it is their second home.

Number Two: Those dining room chairs. These things not only fail at bringing the outside in, they make Your Mama's mouth go dry and have us headed straight to the liquor cabinet. When have the children seen anything so visually insulting pulled up to a dining room table?

Number three: The mammoth photograph of the Pirro-ettes hanging above the credenza in the living room. This tremendous photograph stopped Your Mama's eyes dead in their tracks. We have always found over-sized photographs of children, with their too pressed outfits and fake grins, to have a lurid quality that makes us edgy and uncomfortable.

Number four: The draperies. If only Your Mama was the Queen of the Curtains, banishment of this sort of swagged window treatment would be our first order of bizness. Are these swooping things supposed to be elegantly casual or casually elegant? Whatever they case, they serve no practical purpose, make Your Mama's skin crawl, and ought to be taken out with yesterday's trash.

If Your Mama did not know better, we would be sucked in by the photo of the swimming pool with the lovely water view. However, a quick look at an aerial shot of the development and we see this wee body of water is basically a man-made swamp. For all those that have never been to Florida in the summer, this swamp is no doubt a breeding ground for mosquitoes which makes lounging by that pool nearly impossible without being doused in DDT.

What Your Mama finds most upsetting about both Pirro properties is simple enough. This couple clearly has money to burn and could easily afford to hire a decorator to come in and give them tasteful and rich looking environments. But instead they choose this wild excess that channels Victoria Gotti when they could have had the places done up the esteemed and talented Bunny Williams.

As of today, Tuesday, February 20, 2007, Your Mama has no information on why the Pirro couple is liquidating their real estate assets. Perhaps there are debts to pay. Maybe they're looking for a fresh start, or as is widely rumored there could be a dee-vorce in the near future. Your Mama will certainly give the children and update when and if we hear anything.

Sources: Breakers West Realty Corporation