Add The New York Post on Google In less than a year, this Manhattan townhouse has gone from an alleged squatting scandal to a multimillion-dollar sale.
Mansion Global reports the townhouse at 111 E. 81st St., which hit the market in May for $15 million, has entered into contract after most recently asking $13.99 million.
The identity of the forthcoming owners — and they price they’re paying — are not yet known, but it will be a new chapter following the drama that embroiled the property earlier this year.
In February, a California-based neurologist named Sarah Shalev — who’s tied to the LLC that owns the 6,650-square-foot townhouse — filed a Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit claiming that the home’s live-in housekeeper, Hilarie Page, was squatting inside and preventing Shalev from entering.
Shalev’s estranged husband, the direct-to-consumer mattress executive, Craig Schmeizer, died in the home last November.
According to the complaint at that time, as The Post reported, “Page was a licensee occupying space in the Building with the permission of Schmeizer,” but the “said license of Page to occupy space in the Building was terminated by virtue of the death of Schmeizer.”
It added, “By reason of the termination of her license … Page has no right to use or occupy any portion of the Building.”
The primary issue at hand, court documents alleged, was that the impasse between Shalev and Page was jeopardizing valuable assets inside the home, such as wine and artworks to be inventoried for insurance and estate reasons. What’s more, the building had to be sold due to no income being generated, the documents added, which required brokers and inspectors to access the interior.
Not long after Schmeizer’s death, Shalev called Page, according to an affidavit at the time, and the talk didn’t go well.
“She was extremely hostile, told me she was not going to leave the house because Craig was dead and it was clear that I would not be allowed into the Building,” Shalev claimed in the filing.
Come February, after attorneys’ letters went unanswered and the interiors remaining dark, Shalev and a legal representative attempted to enter.
“We rang the doorbell many times. [sic] pounded on the door and even threw snowballs at windows to get the attention of anybody who might be inside,” Shalev added in the affidavit.
According to the complaint, once the door was opened, Page “ran toward the door, screaming,” and both sides contacted the police, who ultimately instructed the estate’s representatives to leave.
However, the ordeal ended rather quietly. A month after the lawsuit, Page was served with an eviction notice and vacated the residence shortly after, according to the Daily Mail.
Schmeizer purchased the townhouse in February 2022 for $13.25 million. He was 52 years old at the time of his death. It has five bedrooms, an elevator, a garden and roof terraces.
