About Mar-A-Lago - Learn Stuff

Mar-A-Lago has been all over the news, and I realized I knew basically nothing about it. You may not either, so here we go.

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I wasn`t even aware of the place called Mar-A-Lago until about 2017, because the President spent a lot of time there. This was the intention since the 1970`s. Yeah, what?

The massive estate is located in Palm Beach, Florida, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and the Intracoastal Waterway (formerly Lake Worth) to the west. Mar-A-Lago literally means \"Sea to Lake\" in Spanish, so that makes sense.

The property was originally developed by the heiress to the Post cereal fortune Marjorie Merriweather Post between 1924 and 1927. When she died in 1973, Mar-A-Lago was willed to the federal government with the intention of being a \"Winter White House\" for the P.O.T.U.S.. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1980.

Our Presidents really weren`t into it though. Specifically, Nixon and Carter didn`t want to be there. It didn`t take long to realize that maintaining such a palatial residence was extremely expensive, and Mar-A-Lago was returned to the Post family in 1981.

The Post`s didn`t want it either, so it went on the market for $20 million (about $65 million in 2022) the same year. This is where Donald Trump comes in.

Trump initially offered $15 million for the property, but was rejected. In response, he purchased the land across the street and announced his intention to build. This would have blocked the view to the ocean, and interest in Mar-A-Lago from other parties quickly waned. Trump eventually was able to purchase the estate for a mere $7 million, about $10 million total if you include all the extra expenses.

Mar-A-Lago boasts 126 rooms and about 62,500 square feet of living space. That includes 58 bedrooms, 33 bathrooms, and 3... bomb shelters. The place is huge. In 1994 it was converted into a members-only club (instead of a private residence) in order to get around local ordinances. While technically a club, it is now the official primary residence of Donald Trump.

And here I thought it was a golf course of some sort... ooops.