The Wall Street Journal - 20.09.2019

M4| Friday, September 20, 2019 THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

owners are Swedish, says Carl Geving,

managing director of NEF, Norway’s na-

tional association of real-estate agents.

Rustic sod roofs are typical of upscale

mountain homes in Norway, and the new

building boom in places like Hemsedal and

Kvitfjell include contemporary, minimalist

buildings that sport the earthy tops, with

indoor touches such as double-height liv-

ing rooms and open-plan kitchens.

Back in Geilo, Steinar Mikkelsen wanted

a traditional, sod-roof ski cabin, but on a

larger scale. “You need a lot of room in a

vacation home,” he says, alluding to the

Norwegian habit of big family gatherings

at ski resorts during Christmas and Easter.

In 2003, Mr. Mikkelsen, who now has

permanent residence just over Norway’s

border with Sweden, purchased an empty

lot for $252,800, then spent more than $4

million on the home, which is filled with

artisan touches, such as a handcrafted

open fireplace off the kitchen and intricate

hand-carved detailing on the doorways.

Luxury amenities include a combination

sauna and steam room, with tropical-hard-

wood benches, an outdoor Jacuzzi and a

large wine cellar. The two-story home has

two basements for extra volume and a

custom-made wood-burning furnace, in

case the electricity goes out. It was fin-

ished in time for the 2004 ski season.

Mr. Mikkelsen, now 70, shares the home

with his wife, Lena Mikkelsen, 56, a Swed-

ish interior decorator. Once an avid skier

and hunter, he has had to cut back on

cold-weather activities, which prompted

him to sell the home. The couple plans to

spend more time in the Caribbean, where

they keep a sailboat in Antigua.

Oslo real-estate developer Magne Blind-

heim, founder of Eie Eiendomsmegling,

has gone all in on a luxury mountain home

in Hemsedal’s Skigaarden complex. Opting

to rent in the summer, he said he paid

market value, or about $2 million, for a

new 2,000-square-foot Skigaarden unit,

and plans to customize the interior.

He says he regards the complex’s slope-

side setting and many off-piste options as

a luxury. He also prizes the social activi-

ties that the complex’s clublike atmo-

sphere provides. “Even though Skigaarden

is expensive,” he says, “it’s low-key.”

FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT

Norwegians Head for the Hills

Sales of luxury mountain homes in the $1 million range have quadrupled from 2013 to 2018—centered on a handful of resorts

Steinar Mikkelsen, father of rally champion Andreas Mikkelsen, has put the family’s 8,100-square-foot Geilo home on

the market for $3.9 million—currently Norway’s most expensive vacation listing. Below with his wife, Lena Mikkelsen.

MANSION | MOUNTAIN & SKI HOMES ISSUE

$1.4 million

Geilo

Five bedrooms, four bathrooms,^1 / 3 acre

This 2,750-square-foot, 2006 home, with a

steam room, is in Havsdalen, a gated area

accessible only by snowmobile in winter.

Agent: Christian Haatuft, EiendomsMegler 1

ANDREAS MIKKELSEN made his
name racing rally cars, but his
love of sports started on the ski
slopes of Geilo, Norway, an exclu-
sive mountain resort where his
family long vacationed. “We Nor-
wegians are born wearing skis,”
says the 30-year-old Oslo native,
who now lives in Monaco.
Geilo, located midway between
Oslo and Bergen, Norway’s two
largest cities, is known for at-
tracting high earners who use
their mountain homes during the
resort’s six-month ski season, as
well as for fishing, hunting and hiking the rest of the year.
Mr. Mikkelsen’s father, retired Norwegian entrepreneur Steinar
Mikkelsen, has put the family’s 8,100-square-foot Geilo home on the
market for $3.9 million. The six-bedroom, five-bathroom, sod-roof
house—which the Mikkelsens call a “cabin” but is a mansion in all
but name—sits on a half-acre lot some 3,500 feet above sea level. It
is currently the most expensive vacation property advertised for
sale in Norway. But it’s just the tip of the iceberg of the country’s
expanding market for luxury mountain homes.
Some two centuries after pioneer-
ing competitive and recreational ski-
ing, and a half-century after the dis-
covery of oil in the North Sea began
transforming Norway into one of the
world’s wealthiest countries, Norwe-
gians are discovering the joys of liv-
ing the high-altitude high life.
Sales of mountain homes above 9
million Norwegian kroner, or about
$900,000, quadrupled between 2013
and 2018, according to Ambita, a real-
estate technology company based in
Oslo. The luxury segment is far out-
pacing the general mountain-home
market, which has seen growth be-
tween 4% and 6% annually since 2015.
Luxury sales are concentrated in a
handful of resorts to the west and
north of greater Oslo, home to about
one-quarter of the country’s 5.3 mil-
lion people.
Geilo, which pioneered mansion-
size ski cabins over the past decade
or two, is known for its variety of at-
tractions. In addition to Alpine runs,
it offers a vast network of cross-coun-
try trails that wind their way above
the tree line, along with prize-winning
restaurants, prime trout fishing and
easy access by train.
Buyers include Norway’s wealthiest
citizens, such as Oslo billionaire Aage
Thoresen, whose fortune comes from
his family’s grocery and real-estate
businesses. This summer, Mr. Thore-
sen made national headlines when he
paid $6.8 million for a Geilo mountain
compound, setting a record for the
highest price paid for a ski home.
Wealthy Oslo residents have long
had three homes: a year-round resi-
dence in the capital, a summer cabin
on Norway’s southern coast and a
cabin in the mountains. Until a gener-
ation ago, their vacation homes might
have been little more than sheds, with
bunk beds crammed into a single
room and, sometimes, only a latrine
out back. Now, they might have sum-
mer and mountain homes that are
more lavish and more expensive than
their primary residences.
Hemsedal, an hour’s drive north from
Geilo, is known for its young crowd and
après-ski options. Once largely re-
stricted to the rental market, it is ex-
panding into luxury-home sales, including newly built condos going for
up to $1,128 a square foot.
Gjermund Svendsen-Rosendal, who runs EiendomsMegler 1
Fjellmegleren, a real-estate agency specializing in mountain homes,
says he needed only a few days to sell a dozen million-dollar apart-
ments this past Christmas in the latest phase of Hemsedal’s new
mountaintop Skigaarden apartment complex. Built in several stages,
the complex will have about 150 apartments, with about half priced
above $1 million. Last year, a 2,700-square-foot Skigaarden pent-
house sold for $2.5 million.
Geilo, about a three-hour drive from Oslo and Bergen, and Hem-
sedal compete for luxury buyers with Hafjell and Kvitfjell, two re-
sorts developed for the 1994 Winter Olympics in nearby Lillehammer.
In Hafjell—at a two-hour drive, the most convenient major resort for
residents of the capital—Hans Houeland, an Oslo real-agent specializ-
ing in luxury properties, recently sold a 4,300-square-foot, seven-
bedroom home on a half-acre lot for $1.5 million.
Hafjell is known as a family resort, while Kvitfjell, a 45-minute
drive farther north, has Norway’s most challenging skiing, regularly
hosting World Cup racing events. Aksel Lund Svindal, the Norwe-
gian who won the downhill gold medal at the 2018 Winter Olympics
in South Korea, has acquired a lot in Kvitfjell to build a home.
Buyers at all these expanding resorts are overwhelmingly Nor-
wegian, except for Trysil, northeast of Oslo, where some 10% of

BYJ.S.MARCUS

Tips From Svindal

Norway’s skiers, long
dominant in cross-
country events, have
started to excel in Alpine
races. In the 2018 Winter
Olympics in South Korea,
Aksel Lund Svindal , who
grew up in Oslo and
learned to ski in Geilo,
won the gold in the
downhill—turning him
into a national hero.
Mr. Svindal, now 36 and
recently retired from the
ski circuit, is back in
Norway full time,
planning his own new
Kvitfjell cabin and
investing in Hemsedal’s
move to become a
luxury destination.
Mr. Svindal offered his
opinions on the best of
Norway’s ski scene:

Favorite course:
The Olympic slope at
Kvitfjell

Favorite time of year
to ski: February

Favorite off-piste skiing:
Oppdal, south of
Trondheim

Most exotic setting:
Narvik above the Arctic
Circle, with a fjord as a
backdrop

SVEINUNG BRAATHEN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (3); GETTY IMAGES (SVINDAL); KVITFJELL ALPINANLEGG; PETER GREENWOOD (ILLUSTRATION); SHAW NIELSEN (M

AP)

The Kvitfjell ski resort, where Norway’s Olympic ski champion Aksel Lund Svindal has bought a lot to build a home.

$3.9

MILLION

Listing price of the

most expensive

vacation home on the

market in Norway

$6.8

MILLION

Amount paid for a

mountain compound

in Geilo, setting a

record for the highest

price paid for a ski

home

FOR SALE BY THE SLOPES

PÅL HARALD UTHUS