Jeffrey Epstein's Manhattan townhouse just went into contract for $50 million - a 43% cut from its original asking price

• Jeffrey Epstein's New York City townhouse is in contract to sell for $50 million, per the WSJ.
• If the deal closes, the home will have sold at a 43% discount from its original price of $88 million.
• The opulent 1930s mansion has more than 28,000 square feet of living space across seven floors.

Eight months after it hit the market, Jeffrey Epstein's lavish New York City townhouse is in contract to sell for about $50 million, Katherine Clarke reported for the Wall Street Journal.

If the deal closes at that price, it will be a 43% price cut from the home's original $88 million listing price in July 2020. In January, the price was reduced to $65 million.

Epstein, the financier who died in prison in August 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking and conspiracy charges, lived in the Manhattan mansion since the 1990s - but it's unclear exactly how and when he acquired it. A source told the Journal that Epstein paid $20 million for the home in 1998, but the first proof of ownership is dated 2011, when the home was transferred to a company owned by Epstein for $0.

Built in the 1930s on the Upper East Side, the 10-bedroom townhouse is one of the largest private homes in the city, with more than 28,000 square feet of living space spread across seven floors.

The Manhattan townhouse is one of the properties where the late financier was accused of sexually abusing young girls. In July 2019, investigators said they had found "hundreds" of nude photos of girls - some of whom appeared to be underage - at the Upper East Side mansion. Investigators also reported finding bizarre items in the home like a life-size doll hung from a chandelier and an oil painting of Bill Clinton wearing a blue dress and red heels.

Epstein amassed a multimillion-dollar real-estate portfolio in his lifetime, including a private island in the US Virgin Islands, a mansion in Palm Beach, and homes in New Mexico and Paris, France. In November, his estate sold his beachfront Palm Beach mansion for $18 million to a developer who has plans to demolish it.

The proceeds from the sales of the New York townhouse will go to Epstein's estate, which has established a victim's fund for the women accusing Epstein of sexually abusing them when they were minors. The executors of Epstein's estate, however, have been accused of facilitating his sex trafficking scheme in the US Virgin Islands by forcing three of Epstein's accusers to marry in order to avoid being deported.

The listing agent, Adam Modlin of Modlin Group, did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment for this story.