What’s the Climate Risk of These Outrageous Homes?

Glued to real estate posts on The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Dwell, Spaces, The Modern House, or Architectural Digest and wondering how those gorgeous homes will hold up in the next decades? I have you covered.

Heatmap has partnered with my new climate risk platform, Habitable. Every Friday, we add a climate risk score to the real estate listings featured in the news this week and ask: Could you live here as the climate changes?

Using a model developed by a team of Berkeley data scientists at Climate Check, Habitable scores each property for heat, flood, drought, and fire risk on a scale of 1-10. One represents the lowest risk and 10 is the highest. Our rating for each hazard is based on climate change projections through 2050. (You can check your own home’s climate risk here.)

For today’s edition, I apply the Habitable Index to houses in the news this week that are notable for over the top sports amenities. The properties feature soccer fields, golf courses, pickleball courts, and so many basketball courts.

Read on to see if the properties of this competitive set are habitable.

1. Old Westbury, New York, promises a lifetime of sports entertainment.

Nestseekers

The 7-acre Spring Ivy Estate in Old Westbury, New York, is on the market for $50 million. It’s not a house, it’s a resort. Amenity rich, the house is 25,000 square feet with grand luxurious rooms. There are soaring ceilings, a formal dining room, seven bedrooms, 13 bathrooms and an indoor-outdoor kitchen. It may not seem worth the price tag until you reach the lower level entertainment ‘complex.

Nestseekers

There’s a game room, gym, indoor pool, billiards room, a bowling alley, 12-seat movie ‘complex’ with a real sports bar — including three screens over the bar. But what makes it worth the ticket price is the professional NBA-grade basketball court and an indoor golf simulator. The property scores well for climate risk, so let the games begin.

Featured in Mansion Global and listed for $50 million.

2. Celtics co-owner lists his basketball court-filled Weston Massachusetts mansion

Douglas Elliman

The co-owner of the Boston Celtics listed his suburban estate in Weston, Massachusetts, for sale as he downsizes. On 4 acres, it’s 15,000 square feet with seven beds, seven bathes, not one, but 2 basketball courts (one indoor, one outdoor), along with a spa, gym, courts, and a pool. For ultra wealthy, climate-concerned, basketball-crazed buyers, it’s a slam dunk: The house has no risk for flood, barely a risk for drought or fire, and moderate heat risk. There will be years to practice foul shots all day long, year round, in any weather.

Featured in WSJ for just under $9 million.

3. Mahomes trades homes.

Zillow

Super Bowl-winning quarterback Patrick Mahomes has put his Kansas City, Missouri, home on the market for $2,900,000. It’s a small house in a chic neighborhood (near the country club!), but it doesn’t lack amenities. The house has a closet that fits Mahomes’ entire collection of 180 pairs of Adidas sneakers, plus a putting green in the backyard. Habitable checked: The climate forecast, while HOT, is also a winner.

Featured in The Kansas City Star and listed for $2.9 million.

4. Looking Pretty, Music City

French King Fine Properties

This seven-bedroom, eight-bath stone house in Nashville, Tennessee, has all the amenities of a luxury hotel: two pools, a spa, and a full gym that you won’t have to share with other guests. Perfect for a multi-sport family, there’s lots to do here — gardening, cooking at the indoor-outdoor kitchen, swimming laps, and working out at the gym along with playing tennis, pickleball, volleyball, or basketball on the multi-sport court. The only drawback is the boiling heat — hopefully any exercise-loving buyer likes to sweat.

Featured in Mansion Global and listed for just under $10 million.

5. Rod Stewart doesn’t want to talk about it.

Douglas Elliman

He’s not Liberace, but Rod Stewart's house decor will make you wonder. For $70 million, his just-listed, 28,000-square-feet Beverly Hills mansion offers a professional soccer field with two full-size gyms and the most luxurious workout yet.

Douglas Elliman

But hydration will be a problem with extreme flood and fire risk forecasted for the property. Run. Run. Run. Fast.

Featured in The Real Deal and listed for $70 million.

6. Near Coachella and exhausting with possibilities.

DPP Real Estate

This sprawling house in Rancho Mirage in the desert of Coachella Valley looks lush as you drive up the long, gated drive lined with old-growth carob trees. Amenities and activities abound here. Where to start the workout? Try the gym housed in a former stable, then jump in the 80-foot pool before sweaty games on the tennis court, basketball court, putting green, and bocce ball and competitive horseshoe court. Only then are you allowed to check out the hammock. The punishing schedule is no more punishing than the climate here. A full menu of possibilities await but habitability is not one of them. There’s extreme risk of drought, and medium risk for heat, floods, and fires. Yikes.

Featured in Dwell and listed for $4 million.

7. An enthusiastic house that is remarkable in every way.

James Edition

Outside of Salt Lake City Utah, this 50,738-square-foot home is one of the largest homes in the United States (it’s apparently as big as the White House). The theater here has 27 seats! There are 20-foot ceilings and two staircases out front. There are hundreds if not thousands of chandeliers. Sculptures, ornamental window hangings, bathtubs for two! It’s all here for you.

And then some. The pool is not just a pool! It’s a water slide, with a lazy river and rope swings. There is a basketball court, a two-lane bowling alley, a 27-seat theater room, an exercise room, a game room. There is a pirate ship and slide in the children’s play room. And that is just inside.

James Edition

Outside are trails for hiking, biking, camping, hunting, horseback riding, ATV riding, snowmobiling, and cross-country skiing.

Jam packed, but habitable? Sadly, no, because this $17 million house, the pool, the chandeliers, all of it are at extremely high risk of being eventually lost to floods, fire, heat, and drought. Enjoy it while you can.

Featured at Mansion Global and listed for $17 million.