• Glenn Beck has put his house in New Canaan, Connecticut on the market. And he's preparing to take a loss on the sale. The right-wing Fox News host (and gold pitchman) has listed the 8,720-square-foot, six-bedroom home for $3.999 million, which is a quarter of a million dollars less than what he paid for the 2.87-acre estate back in 2005. [Real Estalker, LLR]
• The former Dakota residence of the late model/actress Ruth Ford is now on the market. The three-bedroom co-op, which Ford used to host the likes of Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee and Terrence McNally over the years, is up for sale for $7.5 million. [Cityfile, Corcoran]
• An unidentified "Manhattanite couple" has reportedly gone into contract to buy two duplex penthouses at 166 Perry Street. The apartments had been listed together for a combined $24 million. [Curbed, Corcoran]
• Brooklyn borough president Marty Markowitz and his wife, Jamie, have paid $1.45 million for a two-story home in Windsor Terrace. [NYDN]

Real estate mogul Harry Macklowe made the worst business decision of his life in 2007 when he agreed to spend $7.25 billion to acquire a collection of office buildings in Midtown controlled by Steve Schwarzman's Blackstone Group. (Blackstone had acquired the buildings in 2006 as part of its buyout of Sam Zell's Equity Office Properties.) It's been a long, hard road for Macklowe since then. Creditors have since reclaimed 11 of the properties that Macklowe's real estate firm once controlled, including the iconic GM Building and, as of last week, Worldwide Plaza. The Observer surveys the carnage today, if you're interested in reading about Macklowe's misery in more detail. The good news, if there is any, is that Macklowe hasn't had to sit at his desk and watch his empire unravel over the past few months. He handed over control of the firm to son Billy Macklowe last year, so Billy's been the one with that super-fun job. [NYO]

Harry Macklowe's crumbling real estate empire is getting even smaller. The ex-billionaire purchased the Financial Times building at 1330 Avenue of the Americas in 2006 for $498 million. He's since failed to keep up with his mortgage payments, though, and now it's gone into foreclosure. Unfortunately for Harry and son Billy Macklowe, it's a process they're intimately familiar with: It's the eighth office building in town to slip from their fingers. [Reuters]

Jack Nicholson turns 72 today. Filmmaker John Waters is turning 63. Hotelier Jason Pomeranc is 38. Real estate developer Billy Macklowe is 41. Jewelry designer Kenneth Jay Lane is turning 77. Real estate super agent Kathy Sloane turns 64. The View's Sherri Shepherd is turning 42. Actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan turns 43. And State Senator Ruben Diaz, Sr. is 66 years old today.

It's a Zen-worthy philosophical riddle: If all the boldfaced names who turn up to a store opening deny that they themselves would dream of wearing the clothes, does that neutralize the PR value of their presence? At the launch of Juicy Couture's Fifth Avenue flagship last night, the guest list was a publicist's wet dream—or would have been—if The Transom hadn't asked people what they thought of the label.

Local News

Commercial real-estate history was made this weekend when the debt-inundated Macklowe family saved their rear end by selling the GM Building to Mort Zuckerman's Boston Properties for $2.9 billion, but the juiciest part of the story was the behind-the-scenes battle between Harry and Billy Macklowe. The Wall Street Journal is out with a story this morning about the intrafamilial friction, which basically portrays Macklowe the elder as a past-his-prime loose cannon who irresponsibly bet everything on a $7 billion folly, and Billy as a young genius who heroically saved the family fortune from his father's incompetence.

The son of Harry Macklowe, Billy is the president and chairman of the beleaguered real estate concern Macklowe Properties. His brother-in-law is fellow real estate plutocrat Kent Swig.