Restaurateur Kelly Barnhart Bought $8 Million Houston Home

17 November 2025

Houston’s most-expensive home sale last month was a Memorial Villages house that went to local restaurateur Kelly Barnhart.

The proprietor of Vibrant, a trendy Montrose-area eatery, bought 302 Timberwilde Lane on Oct. 31, according to county records. With an asking price of $8.25 million, the 7,400-square-foot house was the city’s most expensive listing to go under contract in October, according to the Houston Association of Realtors. The asking price amounted to $1,115 per square foot.

The property sold in just a month, almost two weeks faster than the average days on market for Houston luxury, according to Redfin. William Wheless of Wheless Realty had the listing.

The 2.7-acre lot has a tennis court, a golfing green and a pool alongside a 1956-built home with five bedrooms and six bathrooms. The listing beckoned investors with the home’s teardown potential, but Barnhart may prefer to keep it; her restaurant is in a renovated building.

The home wasn’t just the most expensive sale in October; it was also the oldest of the top 10, beating out two spec mansions.

The youngest home on the list, 46 Aria Isle Drive in The Woodlands, was finished earlier this year by custom luxury builder John Post Homes, which was asking $5.5 million when John Wisenbaker bought it on Oct. 17, or about $600 for each of the home’s 9,100 square feet.

Another spec mansion, 606 Pinehaven Drive in Houston, sold to a trust connected to Houston Rockets player Jabari Smith Jr. Rich Strike Holdings, a company owned by local luxury builder Justin Talasek, sold 606 Pinehaven to the King Family Trust, a legal entity managed by Taneskia Purnell, Smith’s mother. The 7,700-square-foot-home home was asking $5.2 million when it sold, about $680 per square foot.

Final sales prices aren’t available, but the spec mansions cut their asking prices before selling, according to Zillow.

John Post Homes originally listed 46 Aria Isle last August for $5.75 million, and Rich Strike Holdings asked $5.35 million for 606 Pinehaven after construction was finished.

The luxury market is slowing across the Sun Belt, but Houston is experiencing a K-shaped market, with top-tier homes growing in value while lower-tier homes depreciate.

The median sale price of Houston luxury grew 4 percent year over year in September, according to Redfin. The average luxury home sold in 43 days in Houston, significantly faster than the national luxury average of 52 days.

As luxury homes appreciated, the overall Houston median home price decreased by 1.5 percent in the same period, according to Homes.com, the widest drop in the country, tied with Austin.

In addition, the mean asking price of last month’s top 10 sales was $6.1 million, up from $5.8 million last October and $4.3 million in October 2023, according to HAR.

Even so, luxury sellers are still adjusting to the reality of reduced negotiating power compared to previous years. Six of the top 10 luxury sales last month had price cuts.