World’s football legend from Brazil, Pele has sold his exclusive Hamptons mansion for £2.2million having owned it for nearly 40 years. The three-time World Cup winner, 77, bought the property for just £120,000 in 1979 but has been looking to shift it for five months.
Pele finally sold the luxurious pad for £300,000 less than originally listed (£2.5m)… but still made a cool £2.08m profit.
The Clearwater Beach retreat in Springs – in the affluent New York district – comes with six bedrooms, five bathrooms and even at outdoor pool. The interior includes extra-high ceilings, an open floorplan and a brand new kitchen – to go with play area, office and even a media room.
Along with the outdoor pool, comes an outside shower and garage.The stunning home sits on the equally impressive coastline, with crystal clear blue waters – a gorgeous 100-mile drive along the Long Island coastline from Manhattan.
Pele bought the incredible home two years after hanging up his football boots – where he last played for New York Cosmos. The 92-cap, 77-goal Brazil international opted to keep a house close to NYC and bought the Hamptons pad soon after retirement.
But after 39 years, Pele has opted for a more low-maintenance housing portfolio and sold it for a cut-price £2.2m.
Pelé’s first international match was a 2–1 defeat against Argentina on 7 July 1957 at the Maracanã. In that match, he scored his first goal for Brazil aged 16 years and nine months, and he remains the youngest goalscorer for his country.
Pelé arrived in Sweden sidelined by a knee injury but on his return from the treatment room, his colleagues stood together and insisted upon his selection.His first match was against the USSR in the third match of the first round of the 1958 FIFA World Cup, where he gave the assist to Vavá’s second goal.He was the youngest player of that tournament, and at the time the youngest ever to play in the World Cup.Against France in the semifinal, Brazil was leading 2–1 at halftime, and then Pelé scored a hat-trick, becoming the youngest in World Cup history to do so.
Pelé was the most famous footballer in the world during the 1966 World Cup in England, and Brazil fielded some world champions like Garrincha, Gilmar and Djalma Santos with the addition of other stars like Jairzinho, Tostão and Gérson, leading to high expectations for them.Brazil was eliminated in the first round, playing only three matches. The World Cup was marked, among other things, for brutal fouls on Pelé that left him injured by the Bulgarian and Portuguese defenders.
Pelé scored the first goal from a free kick against Bulgaria, becoming the first player to score in three successive FIFA World Cups, but due to his injury, a result of persistent fouling by the Bulgarians, he missed the second game against Hungary.
Brazil lost that game and Pelé, although still recovering, was brought back for the last crucial match against Portugal at Goodison Park in Liverpool by the Brazilian coach Vicente Feola. Feola changed the entire defense, including the goalkeeper, while in midfield he returned to the formation of the first match. During the game, Portugal defender João Morais fouled Pelé, but was not sent off by referee George McCabe; a decision retrospectively viewed as being among the worst refereeing errors in World Cup history. Pelé had to stay on the field limping for the rest of the game, since substitutes were not allowed at that time. After this game he vowed he would never again play in the World Cup, a decision he would later change.
In March 2016, Pelé filed a lawsuit against Samsung Electronics in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois seeking US$30 million in damages claiming violations under the Lanham Act for false endorsement and a state law claim for violation of his right of publicity.The suit alleged, that at one point Samsung and Pelé came close to entering into a licensing agreement for Pelé to appear in a Samsung advertising campaign. Samsung abruptly pulled out of the negotiations. The October 2015 Samsung ad in question, included a partial face shot of a man who allegedly “very closely resembles” Pelé and also a superimposed high-definition television screen next to the image of the man featuring a “modified bicycle or scissors-kick”, often used by Pelé.