The Sonoma, Calif., home of Henry Harley “Hap” Arnold, who commanded U.S. Army air forces in World War II, has gone on the market for $2.65 million.

General Arnold and his wife, Eleanor, built the 2,000-square-foot house, named El Rancho Feliz (The Happy Ranch), in the 1940s and moved there following his retirement from the service in 1946. It’s where he wrote his 1949 memoir, Global Mission. He died in 1950 at age 63.

Robert Arnold, the general’s grandson, now owns the 35-acre property, which he converted from a cattle ranch to a vineyard with Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. He restored the house with radiant floor heating and new windows. The house has redwood ceilings, a wood-burning fireplace and views of the Sonoma Valley. Robert and Kathleen Leonard, of Sotheby’s International Realty, have the listing.

General Arnold, whom Orville Wright taught to fly in 1911, was key to the Allied victory. (The U.S. Air Force became a separate military branch in 1947.)

Designer’s apartment on market

The Manhattan apartment of Fernando Sanchez, who achieved fame in the 1970s for designing lingerie worn as outerwear, is listed at $6.5 million.

The 4,000-square-foot co-operative unit is in the Osborne, built in 1885 and diagonally across from Carnegie Hall. The 10-room apartment, on three floors, has a 27-foot entry gallery, a formal dining room, a library and four baths. There are original moldings and parquet flooring.

Sanchez, whose designs were worn by Tina Turner and Madonna (the wedding dress in her “Like a Virgin” video), bought the apartment in 1979 for less than $1 million. He died in June 2006 at age 70 after being bitten by a sand fly and contracting a parasite while traveling, says Jano Herbosch, Sanchez’s business partner and cousin by marriage. Sanchez left no heirs. Proceeds are to go to an arts foundation to be named after him.

High-end houses seeking rentors

As sales slow in even the most exclusive enclaves, sellers of so-called trophy homes are increasingly renting out their houses. In Manhattan, Eleanor Roosevelt’s former home is now for rent at $60,000 a month. Across the continent, Prince is renting a “spec” house, on sale for $50 million, from its developer.

The pop star is paying $200,000 a month for 30,000-square-foot Tuscan-style mansion, which has a pool, in the Beverly Park enclave of Beverly Hills, Calif. Developer George Santopietro put the house up for sale in August, and Mauricio Umansky of Hilton & Hyland, an affiliate of Christie’s Great Estates, handled the rental and has the sales listing.

As for the former first lady’s home, the renovated 18-foot-wide Upper East Side townhouse has five bedrooms, a garden and a roof terrace. Owners Vikram Gandhi, a managing director at Credit Suisse, and his wife, Meera, listed the limestone structure in December for $20 million. The couple paid $4.3 million for it in 2000.