While it's true that the Chinese Flu Panic is helping flush out our ancient inventory, price cuts help, too

1 Harbor Drive, Belle Haven, priced (now) at $10.950 million, is under contract. The late, and truly great realtor David Ogilvy had this place on the market since 2010, when he started it off at $20 million and kept it there, forever, until his demise. There’s probably no other realtor in town who could command such loyalty from his customers (though Joe Barbieri’s got some pretty slodgy old dogs in his portfolio). But David’s gone, and so is that price, and now, it seems, so is the house.

A grand old 1893 home, completely redone by Hobbs in 2000, it’d be a fine house to live in, and at this price, a decent buy. But the hard truth is that $10 million is about what a 2-acre lot in Belle Haven sells for, so I’m guessing that its neighbors will soon see something new going up here, a building that more suitably reflects the new owner’s importance and taste.