Madoff beach house sells for more than $8.75m

       It boasts ocean views, an infamous former owner - and now a buyer willing to pay more than $8.75 million.
       An unidentified would-be buyer or buyers snapped up Bernard Madoff's Long Island beach house within days after the US Marshals Service put the seized property up for sale, a spokeswoman for the broker the Corcoran Group said on Thursday.
       Spokeswoman Anne Lacombe said the fallen money manager's Montauk retreat was under contract for more than its $8.75 million asking price. She didn't have the exact figure, any information on the intended buyer or the closing date.
       US Marshal Joseph R. Guccione said in a statement the potential buyer's identity and price were being kept private to protect a deal that has yet to close.
       The Marshals Service put the 3,000-square-foot (280 square metre) house on the market Sept 1 in order to help repay victims of Madoff's massive investment fraud.
       The listing attracted an onslaught of responses and numerous bids, Lacombe said. She said the highest bid was taken.
       Madoff's notoriety "made it come to a lot of people's attention, but it's really all about the location of the views and the home," she said.
       The four-bedroom house is set on a 1.2-acre (0.5-hectare) lot amid the dunes in Montauk, a windswept beach community east of the Hamptons. The house is modest by Hamptons standards, but it boasts stunning views of the Atlantic Ocean and sits closer to the surf than zoning laws now allow.
       "These kind of properties are very rare," Lacombe said.
       Madoff,71, was sentenced in June to 150 years in prison for orchestrating a Ponzi scheme that encompassed thousands of investors and billions of dollars.
       His punishment included a forfeiture order that stripped him and his wife,Ruth, of nearly all their wealth. The order gave the marshals authority to seize and sell the Madoffs' homes.
       Their five-bedroom waterfront mansion in Palm Beach, Florida,"remains on the market for $8.5 million," Lacombe said.
       Their Manhattan penthouse, listed at $9.9 million, has drawn several seriously interested potential buyers, said Anne Corey, the Sotheby's International Realty broker representing that property.
       Meanwhile, security has been tightened at the Montauk home after the theft of a $300 sculpture off the front porch late last week,Newsday reported.The East Hampton Town police didn't immediately return a telephone call about the theft on Thursday.