In a piece seeming written for the least popular woman in New Cannan, Connecticut, Cristina Ross, Slate has up an interesting piece by Daniel Gross about whether or not buying famous pieces of architecture is a good investment or not. Surprise surprise, when you buy a multi-million dollar home that’s likely fairly eccentric (see: the architect didn’t always care so much how functional things like plumbing or privacy were in the planning process), you might have some trouble down the line unloading the thing. Working off the great expenses needed to keep the Glass House, now the pricey showpiece of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, alive and well as a model, Gross compares architecture to other expensive collectibles, like paintings, and ultimately finds:

In the end, it’s a real-estate transaction, and, as such, it’s subject to all the whims of that market. The Kaufmann house was placed on the market, as many homes are, because the owners were getting divorced. And after all the hoopla surrounding the $16.8 million bid for it, the deal, like so many other housing deals these days, fell through.