14-time NBA all-star Shaquille O’Neal has slashed $3 million from the asking price of his 26 Star Island Drive mansion on Miami Beach’s exclusive man-made island community. Now at $29 million, Shaq Diesel had previously listed at $32 million, which was actually a trimming from an original listing of $35 million. The property has a lot size of 106,888 square feet (sitting on two and a half acres) that includes: a 19,000-plus square foot house with eight bedrooms and nine full baths, an indoor basketball court, gym, stream room and sauna. There’s also a two-bedroom guest house, maids quarters, a full tennis court, indoor racquetball court, a pool, 300 feet of dockage, and a six-car garage. The Biscayne Bay home was custom-built by ex-Miami Heat center Rony Seikaly in 1992, so it also boasts eight-foot doorways.
Shaq, the 36-year old cinematic star of Blue Chip, Kazaam, and Steel, bought the waterfront property from South American soda magnate Juan Carlos Correa for roughly $19 million in 2004, shortly after arriving in Miami from the Los Angeles Lakers. The 3-time NBA finals MVP bought the digs through his Chexy Trust in 2004 for $18.8 million, according to public records. When he purchased the pad, O’Neal promised Magic City residents that he’d soon be walking naked on the beach. After he listed the trophy property in 2005, Shaq was reported to have been eyeing a Rio Vista Isles, Florida. mansion that had been listed for $22.5 million (but that was not on the market when Shaq was considering it). That deal never happened, and Shaq later pulled the Star Island mansion off the market. Although Shaq was traded in February from the Miami Heat to the Phoenix Suns, he already had the property on the market, and he had a solid buyer: A-Rod (Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees). In fact, A-Rod was under contract on the estate, but he wound up taking an intentional walk from the deal. Ironically, the reason concerned A-Rod’s newly estranged wife, Cynthia, with whom he has recently been going through an acrimonious and very public split from. She was expecting a baby in April and wanted to stay closer to her parents who live in Coconut Grove, about 15 minutes away; A-Rod exercised a 30-day termination clause.
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