Even during his 35-year career as an Italian racecar driver, Alessandro Zampedri always knew he wanted to shift into real estate at some point.  After a journey that took him from Italy to the Indy 500 and across the world racing Porsches, the 53-year-old worked as a developer on projects from coast to coast in the United States. For his latest project, he's working on a pair of luxury villas in the eastern Long Island town of Montauk that could break records for the fishing village-turned-elite vacation hamlet.

The project — dubbed "The Maple Villas" — is aiming high. The villas designed by the famed Italian architectural firm Lissoni Casal Ribeiro and built by Walker Ridge are listed for $18.5 million and $19.5 million by Kyle Rokso and Marcy Braun of the Eklund Gomes Team at Douglas Elliman.