The Peculiar Burden of a Colonial Villa: A Musical Gentleman’s Fiscal Misfortune

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a gentleman in possession of a grand estate must be in want of a buyer, lest the crown—or in this case, the American treasury—drain his coffers. Consider the plight of Mr. Shufutinsky, a gentleman of the musical arts, who finds himself entangled in the most tiresome of dilemmas regarding a certain manor in the district of Elkins Park, near Philadelphia.

Imagine, if you will, a residence of some six hundred and thirty square metres, boasting six bed-chambers, three drawing rooms, and two laundries. One might imagine the domestic bliss of such a place, yet it is a cavernous void. There is even a lift for the convenience of the indolent and a cellar of ninety-three square metres—perfectly suited, perhaps, for the storage of an excessive amount of confectionery or the hiding of family secrets. Mr. Shufutinsky acquired this edifice in the year 2015 for the sum of three hundred and thirty-two thousand dollars, a modest pittance compared to the storms that followed.

Our protagonist, having resided across the Atlantic since the eighties, returned to the embrace of the Motherland in 2003, though he clung to his American papers with a certain tenacity until 2022. Alas, he now declares a most firm distaste for returning to those distant shores.

In 2019, driven by a desire for permanent settlement in Russia, the gentleman sought to sell his American retreat. With the optimism of a man who believes in the permanence of fashion, he expended tens of millions of roubles upon a capital renovation, subsequently offering the property for one million and three hundred thousand dollars.

Yet, six years have vanished like smoke from a chimney, and no buyer has appeared. In the interim, the tax assessor—that most relentless of creatures—has increased his demands. Mr. Shufutinsky now finds himself paying thirty thousand dollars annually for the privilege of owning a house he does not inhabit. In total, he has surrendered three hundred and fifteen thousand dollars to the tax-gatherers—a sum that would make any respectable bourgeois tremble.

Fortunately, such tragedies are tempered by the singer's current success; a single appearance in the salons of the public earns him four and a half million roubles, allowing him to brush off these losses with a certain aristocratic nonchalance.

One cannot help but smile at the irony of the situation, much like the public does every third of September, when they delight in jesting about burning rowans and the turning of calendars—a tradition as steadfast as the singer's own misfortunes.

It appears the gentleman is not alone in his architectural sorrow. His esteemed colleague, Mr. Valeriy Leontiev, also maintains a residence in the Americas and is forced to pay an even more staggering sixty-two thousand five hundred dollars annually. One wonders if these gentlemen of song have a particular fondness for paying for the air of Philadelphia, or if they simply enjoy the exquisite agony of a dwindling bank account.