Fallen St. Paul developer, Jerry Trooien of the JLT Group, recently sold this Summit Avenue manse in a short sale for nearly a half-million dollars less than he paid. The sale was recorded on August 29 for $958,000 with a previously recorded sale price of $1.4 million in 2002.

The house, which was built in 1901 at 965 Summit Av., has been on and off the market since 2010. It has six bedrooms, seven bathrooms and about 7,500 square-feet, and has an estimated market value of $1.6 million with annual property taxes of about $35,000, according to county records, which also describe the sale as a "Forced Sale Or Legal Action Or Foreclosure." The listing agent, Silvana Zoraqi of Edina Realty, said that because the house sold for less than was owed on the mortgage, it was a short sale.

Trooien, whose empire was been plagued by legal disputes with lenders and problems in his commercial real estate portfolio, filed for a Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2010, owing creditors $284 million. He exited bankruptcy in 2011.

Federal prosecutors charged nine people with defrauding mortgage lenders of more than $14 million at Cloud 9, a former office building in Minnetonka that Trooien's firm redeveloped into condos at the height of the housing boom. Trooien has not been charged in the case.

As housing prices rise in the metro, these short sales are becoming far less common.