Photos: This Miami-Style Mansion in Maryland Is a Versace—or Cheesecake Factory—Fan’s Paradise
The pool—the mansion’s crown jewel—was modeled after the Versace Mansion pool in Miami. Photograph courtesy of Daniel Heider via Zillow.
Don’t be fooled: this mansion isn’t in Miami. The ritzy, glitzy, over-the-top villa—which went on the market for $4,995,000 last Friday—is in Potomac, Maryland.
Even by the standards of the notoriously wealthy portion of River Road on which it’s located (called the “Millionaire’s Mile”) the estate—known as “Casa de Amor”—stands out. For one thing, the sprawling home, with its red tiled roofs and stone-white turrets, looks like it was copied-and-pasted straight from a Mediterranean beach. It’s a contrast to the area’s typical Georgian and Colonial style homes.
“It was designed to host the most unbelievable over-the top-parties of all time,” said Daniel Heider, the real estate agent representing the sellers. “I mean, there’s basically a scale replica of the Gianni Versace pool [in South Beach]. It’s just epic.”
But the house has been on and off the market since 2016, and has dropped in price by more than $2 million since then. It was previously listed with another agent, and Heider’s team has come in to “shift the paradigm and ultimately get it sold” with a new staging and marketing strategy. Heider recently threw a Miami Vice-style party for 150 brokers at the home, complete with a bongo player, electric pianist, frozen margaritas, and made-to-order ceviche.
Though Heider wouldn’t share who its sellers are, he described them as “very successful business folks” who built the home in 2009, put it up for sale in 2016, and are now “harnessing the power of this market.” According to the Washington Business Journal, they are Carlos and May-May Horcasitas, who founded a Germantown-based petroleum company.
They clearly have a taste for lavish living. The list of hedonistic perks is extensive. Aside from the 50-foot pool surrounded by palm trees and mosaic work, it comes with a fully enclosed two-story entertaining area; a dedicated pool bath with a steam shower; a massive dressing room with multiple islands in the master bedroom; an outdoor putting green; a glass-and-stone wine cellar; and an observation tower with unobstructed views of the area.
“You get up [to the observation tower] through an elevator that has glass panels and hand-painted frescoes in the elevator shaft, and it opens up and just reveals this unbelievable perspective of Potomac that you just do not get anywhere,” said Heider. “The sellers really liked enjoying a cigar up there and a glass of wine or scotch.”
Heider says that the house already has multiple offers and is likely “going to be selling way north of where it’s currently listed.” The agent recently sold a $7.4 million home just across the street.
While Heider is obviously excited about the home, the internet has been having fun with it, comparing it to an oversized Olive Garden or Cheesecake Factory. “This house has always been the Final Boss of extremely tacky Potomac real estate,” wrote one Twitter user. One TikTok commenter wrote, “well this confirms it…….. money can’t buy good taste.”
To those critiques, Heider puts it simply: “For every home, there is a buyer.”
