Why Barbara Corcoran Just Walked Away From Her Dream Home

Barbara Corcoran is turning the page on a dream decades in the making. The Shark Tank star and real estate mogul just listed her two-story penthouse in Manhattan’s Carnegie Hill for $12 million, a luxury property she once could only admire from afar.

Back in 1992, Corcoran spotted the stunning duplex while working a side-gig as a messenger. Her real estate business was still struggling to find traction, but the penthouse—with its sweeping views of Central Park and oversized windows—stuck with her. “I asked the owner at the time to let me know if it ever went on sale,” she told The New York Times. More than two decades later, in 2015, it finally did. By then, Corcoran was a self-made multimillionaire.

She snapped it up for $10 million and poured years into transforming it into what she calls her “palace in the sky.” The 3,800-square-foot home features four bedrooms, four full baths, and a solarium dining room converted from an old greenhouse. The glass-walled room leads to a private terrace, making it ideal for dinner parties overlooking the Upper East Side.

But even dream homes aren’t forever. On Instagram, Corcoran shared that she and husband Bill Higgins are trading in the penthouse for a one-story home that better suits their needs. “It’s time to begin our next chapter,” she wrote, citing Higgins’ difficulty with the home’s staircase.

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Corcoran built her real estate empire from a $1,000 loan and sold it in 2001 for $66 million. She’s been a fixture on Shark Tank for 16 years and is known for her bold business instincts—something she clearly brought to her personal life, too.