The old place was swanky.

It has a 24-hour doorman and river views, but the real appeal of 377 Rector Place—a building that is about as bland as a luxury tower can be—lies in its name: Liberty House. Particularly if one is about to start a 10-year prison sentence.

The New York Post reports that Peter Madoff and wife Marion have moved into a $3,200-per month one-bedroom rental in the Battery Park City building. For someone who has agreed, as part of plea bargain, to the criminal forfeiture of $143.1 billion, including all real estate and personal property, a rental is definitely the way to go.

The new place: not bad. Way nicer than prison.

Of the couple's vast, ill-begotten fortune, Marion was allowed to keep $771,733, an amount that still seems like a fortune to most of us, if not a vast one.

Madoff frère pleaded guilty in June to helping his brother bilk investors out of out billions, although he maintained that he had no idea that by falsifying business records he was helping to perpetrate what may go down in history as the greatest Ponzi scheme of all time.

A claim that was dismissed by US District Judge Laura Swain as “frankly, not believable,” according to the Daily News

The Madoffs needed someplace to stay, having just sold their 7-room co-op at 975 Park Avenue for $4.6 million.

While the provenance of Mr. Madoff's former pad might bother some potential buyers, all proceeds of the sale go to victim restitution. Sources have said that the Madoffs weren't even allowed to keep their dishes and other basic household items. Time for an Ikea run?

Mr. Madoff has less than a month to enjoy his liberty, Liberty House or the view of Lady Liberty in the New York Harbor. He's scheduled to start serving his sentence on February 6, thanks to a delay he was granted to attend his granddaughter's Bat Mitzvah.

As for the properties belonging to the rest of the Madoff clan, they will likely hit the market in the not-too-distant future as prosecutors and trustees make their way through the massively complicated fraud case. These include Andrew Madoff's $4.3 million apartment at 433 East 74th Street and Mark Madoff’s $6 million Soho apartment at 583 Broadway Avenue, where he committed suicide. Both of the brothers' Greenwich homes are also in the mix.

kvelsey@observer.com

The government came for Ruth and Bernie Madoff's penthouse years ago, but the real estate holdings of the rest of the family have taken a little longer to claim, as the courts untangle the many complications of recovering cash stolen by the clan.

But now a two-bedroom Park Avenue co-op owned by Bernie's brother Peter has finally hit the market, The Wall Street Journal reports. And lis penden notices have been filed against properties belonging to Madoff's son Andrew and late son Mark, according to The New York Post. Altogether, the homes are worth more than $20 million.

The sixth floor co-op that Peter Madoff owned at 975 Park Avenue is now on the market for $4 million, which is $100,000 less than Mr. Madoff and his wife Marion paid for it in 2004, according to The Journal, not counting the cost of renovations. Not that the sale price matters to the couple.

Neither Mrs. nor Mr. Madoff—who pled guilty to fraud charges in June—will get the proceeds of this sale or the sale of their house on Long Island, which is currently on the market for $5.29 million. The monies will be turned over to the U.S. Marshals Service, as part of an agreement that Mr. Madoff and his family signed as part of his guilty plea.

But Mr. Madoff won't need the place anymore anyway. He'll be living in far less lavish accommodations—a prison cell—when he begins his 10-year sentence later this year. As for Ms. Madoff, she can buy a more modest pad with the $771,733 she's allowed to keep as part of the settlement (we'd recommend Yorkville).

The properties belonging to Bernie Madoff's two sons and their families have not yet hit the market, but the lis penden notices warn potential buyers that they really aren't really the Madoff family's to sell. Trustee Irving Picard has a claim to both Andrew Madoff's $4.3 million apartment at 433 East 74th Street and Mark Madoff's $6 million Soho apartment at 583 Broadway Avenue, where he committed suicide (we doubt that one will sell anytime soon anyway). The government is also going after both of the brother's houses in Greenwich. Just how much the government can claim depends on the resolution of the $255 million suit against Madoff's relatives.

kvelsey@observer.com