from: http://www.aci.net/kalliste/ Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin Grabbe</A> ----- Offshore, Onshore Shopping for Islands A pharmacy for the soul. You don't have to be shipwrecked or a millionaire to own your own island, says Farhad Vladi. William Langley visits the world's leading island broker ON a greasy day in central Hamburg Dr Farhad Vladi, the world's foremost broker of private islands, cuts a reassuring figure of precision-dressed German corporate correctness. Except that he is sitting beneath a nine-foot artificial palm tree. In the abundant foliage above his head nestles a large felt parrot. Outside, a grey drizzle is falling on Binnenalster Lake, but here in Vladi's office you can almost smell the trade winds. Down the years, Vladi, who has Russian and Iranian ancestry, has sold more than 700 islands to some of the richest people on earth. Much of his time is spent combing the world's seas and lakes for new properties but, shortage being the essence of exclusivity, there are never enough to meet the demand. Vladi, 54, loves islands. He talks about them with a passion that goes so far beyond the call of duty that I have the impression he only drops by the office to bank his commissions. 'An island', he tells me, in tones of near-Goethesque wonder, 'is a pharmacy for the soul. Island people are different. They step ashore on an island and they change.' As the world's few remaining escape routes have been steadily closed off, islands have become hot properties. The market has soared, particularly in the last decade, but in Vladi's view, the prices remain outrageously reasonable. 'What does �330,000 buy you in London?' he asks. A three-bedroom flat in Chiswick, I tell him. 'Right, and for that money I can sell you a 1,000-acre Pacific island off Panama with four miles of sandy beaches, a big house, an airstrip, a natural harbour, lush vegetation, clean water. But what you really get for your money is your life back. 'I see people stressed out, messed-up. All their money doing them no damn good. They take a look at an island, and it's suddenly all they want. There was a guy, earlier this year. A Wall Street player. He'd made billions... and I showed him this island, and I told him about all the communications and the generators, and he said, "I don't want any of that stuff. I just want to be here with my family. We'll light candles." I just sold an island in the Bahamas to Nicolas Cage. It's about 50 acres. Very isolated, very beautiful. Wonderful fauna. I must not tell you any more. We flew there by helicopter, me and Nicolas and his wife, and within a few minutes of landing I could see this look on their faces - I have seen it so many times before - that says, "Yes. At last! I can be happy here." And it is something I still don't fully understand. But it is to do with the effect of an island on the soul.' When he is waxing away like this, Vladi becomes a strange synthesis of idealist and hard-nosed businessman. One moment he is quoting Rousseau, the next he is moaning about the inconsiderate refusal of Third World countries to let him sell off all their islands. 'Now, if a place like Indonesia changed its laws tomorrow,' he sighs, 'I could grow the whole market.' Vladi estimates that the total world stock of purchasable islands is currently around 3,000, of which only a hundred or so are available at any one time. An infuriating paradox of his business is that the countries with the most islands are almost invariably the ones least willing to sell them. China has tens of thousands, but won't trade. The same goes for India, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam. Even relatively accessible markets such as Australia, New Zealand and Polynesia frequently allow only 50 per cent ownership, with the rest held by the state. The current boom in island prices is being driven by technology. With laptops and cell-phones, we can be as cut off or as connected as we want. Equipment originally developed for the offshore oil industry provides cheap power and a reliable fresh water supply. Pre-fabricated homes can be dropped by helicopter and assembled in a week. But there is another way in which the new economy is helping. Island homes have become a prime destination for the enormous fortunes being made in the dotcom industry. The famous, the private and the wealthy have long been susceptible to the lure of island life. Until they parted last year, Claudia Schiffer and her soi-disant fianc� David Copperfield were leasing one of the Virgin Islands. Vladi winces slightly at the memory of this (it does not appear to have been an entirely happy arrangement) and murmurs enigmatically, 'Not everyone is suitable for island life.' Claudia was last spotted in landlocked London with her new squeeze, the gallery owner Tim Jeffries. When I tell him this, Vladi looks faintly relieved. He recently sold a wild and rugged place off the coast of Nova Scotia to Tony Curtis, who likes to paint in seclusion. The psychologist Edward de Bono, originator of lateral thinking, has bought three islands from Vladi, one of them in the Laguna Veneta, north of Venice. 'It wasn't anything like the kind of island he was actually looking for,' says Vladi, 'but when he saw it he wanted it straight away. I suppose that's lateral thinking.' Vladi became fascinated by islands after reading Robinson Crusoe as a small boy growing up in Hamburg. 'When you're a kid there's a kind of magic about the idea of being on your own island,' he says. 'Most of us grow out of it, but not me.' When he was 20, and studying for a degree in philosophy, he read a magazine article about someone who had bought a private island for what seemed a pittance and thought he would do the same. But the cheapest place he could find was in the Seychelles, and it was far more expensive than he had imagined. 'I was heartbroken,' he says. 'And then I thought, "Maybe I could get someone else to buy it, and make a little money for myself."' So he scouted around for potential candidates, and approached Robert Vogel, a prominent Hamburg property developer. 'Vogel was, and still is, one of the richest men in the city, but he had never thought of buying an island,' says Vladi. 'I persuaded him to fly out and see the place, which was called Cousin Island. He thought it was beautiful and decided immediately that he wanted it. When he got back he called me up and said, "Look, young man, you are on to a good thing here, but you know absolutely nothing about selling property. Come to me and I will teach you as though you were my own son."' Soon afterwards Vladi was in a position to set up on his own. The islands on Vladi's books typically range from �13 million for a palm-fringed private paradise to �6,500 for a lump of rain-drenched granite in a Canadian lake. Although most of his sales are in the premium segment of the market, he also deals in cheaper properties - partly to promote the notion of island ownership. He boasts in his advertising material that, 'If you can afford a car, you can afford an island.' I tell Vladi that this seems hard to believe. What about the costs of getting to the place? What about land taxes, upkeep, security (one island owner in the Caribbean was recently run off his property at gunpoint by invading drug smugglers), and the cost of fuel, food and water? 'Not everyone needs these things,' Vladi says. 'If you can grow vegetables and row a boat, we probably have an island that will suit you. Believe me, it's a cheap way to live.' The most extravagant property now on his books is Laucala Island, the Fijian fantasy home of the late publishing tycoon Malcolm S Forbes. Spotted by Captain Bligh in 1787, the three-by-two-mile volcanic island - 135 miles from Suva - was bought by Forbes in 1972. Forbes, who liked to dress in biker leathers and was Elizabeth Taylor's frequent escort, built a house there and employed the entire local population of 220. But his heir, Steve Forbes, the Mr Whippy look-alike and maverick Republican with ambitions to be President of the United States, has no time to visit Fiji, and is asking �6.5 million for Laucala. As an inducement, the buyer will be offered Forbes's famous compound off Tangiers, for the knock-down price of �4 million. Of all the islands currently on the market, Vladi's favourite is Pohuenui Island in New Zealand's Marlborough Sound. At just under �3.3 million, it covers 5,500 acres and includes a large homestead and a working farm with 3,000 sheep. 'A great feature of this island,' says Vladi, 'is that it actually makes a profit. It's very green, very clean, with 1,500ft elevations and wonderful marine life.' Pohuenui was the prize possession of Dieter Kathmann, a Swiss businessman who made his fortune selling farm equipment and became a prolific collector of islands. At the time of his death in 1987 he owned 12, and his heirs are still offloading them. Vladi helped Richard Branson secure Necker Island in the Caribbean, and now manages it on the Virgin tycoon's behalf. 'It's not difficult to mess up an island, and I think Branson has done a good job there in terms of sensitive development,' he says. 'We charge about �10,000 a day to rent it, which makes it probably the priciest island around, but if you get a party together it's no more than staying at a good hotel.' What kind of a person - other than a rich one - does it take to feel at home on an island? 'I went through all my books and records trying to draw up a psychological profile of the ideal buyer,' says Vladi. 'And you know what? All they had in common was a strong streak of individualism and self-confidence. They want to put their own stamp on their surroundings. You can't do that in the city, but with an island you can make it yours.' Vladi has owned several islands. He currently has two; one in Sleepy Cove, Nova Scotia and another off the northern tip of New Zealand's South Island. Although business is business, Vladi finds it painful to see islands sold to people who merely want them as trophy assets. Looking with him through the brochures of the islands he has for sale it's hard not to share a sense of outrage at the thought of such places being playthings for spivs. 'I always say to people, "Stay on an island before you buy one. Think about it carefully. It's different from what you imagine." But there's just so much money around today, and people want beautiful things to show them off. They keep photographs of their islands in their wallets to pull out at parties. Like you would with your children. I hate all that.' With these bleak thoughts in mind, Vladi has devised an introductory course to island life. Potential clients are dropped off on a remote island near Chile for three days. They are given a survival kit, comprising a tent, Swiss Army knife, water canister, compass and a copy of Robinson Crusoe, all packed inside a designer bag. 'You know they aren't serious if they prefer the bag to the island,' says Vladi. 'It's a good deal all round.' The London Telegraph, July 24, 2000 ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, All My Relations. Omnia Bona Bonis, Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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