Florida Mansion for Sale: $10

Want to buy a 6,442 square-foot Florida mansion for $10? That's the proposition that Miles and Laura Brannan are offering as a way of unloading their elegant water-front home in Ft. Lauderdale.
The couple, who both work in real estate, say the slowing economy has made it difficult to afford the elegant mansion they purchased in 2005, so they're raffling it off for $10 a ticket. Only 300,000 tickets will be sold. The raffle will be held on December 31, 2009.
What happens if they don't sell all 300,000 tickets by then? Then they say they'll split the proceeds of the raffle between the winner and a drug treatment center called The Mission of St. Francis and figure out another way to sell the house. The home has six bedrooms, 6.5 baths and a home theater with a 120" screen, not to mention a four-car garage and 1,000 square-foot master bedroom with a balcony overlooking the water.

On first brush, I figured the raffle was a scam. But the couple's press materials maintain that Chicago Title is holding the money, so I called the title company's Ft. Lauderdale office to check. Sure enough, a spokeswoman for the title company says they have the cash in hand and that they wouldn't let anyone use their company's name if they didn't.

So, what's the catch? Well if you win the house, the property taxes amount to $34,000. And, according to both Zillow and Google maps, you'd have the biggest and most expensive home in the neighborhood. That's not good for resale value, but if you got the house for $10, you probably don't care.

If even the taxes of a $3 million mansion aren't in your price range, check out Ilyce Glink's blog, where she explains that the government is throwing one lucrative incentive after the next at today's prospective buyers.