Housing
This section of the BDN aims to help readers understand Maine’s housing crisis, the volatile real estate market and the public policy behind them. Read more Housing coverage here.
The value of a billionaire’s compound in an exclusive Mount Desert neighborhood has jumped significantly as renovations on the site continue, hinting at what’s underway at the multimillion-dollar property.
Mitchell Rales, a minority owner of the Washington Commanders, bought a nearly 15-acre oceanfront property on Mount Desert’s Cooksey Drive in January 2018 for $19 million. The site, called Ringing Point, was previously the summer home of billionaire philanthropist David Rockefeller Sr., who died in 2017 at the age of 101.
In the years since, Rales, who lives in the Washington, D.C., area when he’s not in Maine, has spent millions of dollars renovating the site to include multiple smaller buildings rather than one hulking estate, like those found elsewhere in the area.
The property’s assessed value rose by more than $5 million from 2024 to 2025, town records show, marking the most significant jump since Rales demolished the former Rockefeller estate. The spike gives a glimpse into the years-long project, which still appears to be underway.
Attempts to reach Rales for comment on Thursday were unsuccessful.
In 2020 — as far back as town assessment records show — the property was worth roughly $11.4 million. The value dipped as low as $9.6 million in 2023, the year after Rockefeller’s former seven-bedroom home on the property was demolished, town property records show.
The property value buoyed back up to roughly $11.5 million in 2024 after construction of Rales’ new compound began, then spiked to just shy of $17 million in 2025, according to town assessment documents.
Town records show four residential buildings are under construction there now, all of which are slated to have wood shingle exteriors with hardwood floors and granite fireplaces.
The largest, a 2,904-square-foot building, has two half-bathrooms and one large living area. The other three each have one bedroom, one full bathroom and vary in size from 972 to 1,170 square feet.
Rales received permits from the town in 2022, 2023 and 2024 to construct the buildings. The largest is intended to serve as a gathering place for Rales’ family and friends, with a kitchen and dining area, while the other buildings act as sleeping quarters.
But that’s not the only Maine property Rales has purchased and redeveloped.
Rales bought 46 Cooksey Drive, located across the street, in 2019 for $2.8 million, which has served as a staging area for the demolition and construction work happening at Ringing Point. Rales demolished a house there in 2023 and now is constructing a large operations building intended for Rales’ personal staff.
The two properties are located in Mount Desert’s Seal Harbor neighborhood on the southern coast, just south of Acadia National Park. The area is home to summer getaways of other celebrities, including Martha Stewart and Dick Wolf, the creator of the long-running “Law & Order” television show.
Rales also bought a 5,000-square-foot house in the neighboring village of Northeast Harbor in 2022 and had it demolished. He has been issued a permit to construct a foundation for a new house on the site, but town records don’t show details for what might be constructed on the 5-acre property.
In 2007, Rales bought Blueberry Ledge, the former home of Washington socialite Susan Mary Alsop, for $5.5 million. He tore it down and built an 8,000-square-foot contemporary-design mansion.
Forbes placed Rales’ net worth at $3.8 billion as of Thursday.
