I just did a search on JC Wilson, Washington home and found where I had seen this. It is Rasmusen.org where he quotes from the January 2004 Vanity Fair article. It says:
"The Wilsons live in the Palisades, an affluent neighborhood of Washington, D.C., on the fringe of Georgetown. In winter, when the trees have no leaves, the back of their house has a stunning view of the Washington Monument. They'd first seen the house in 1998, when it was still being built, and they had instantly fallen in love with it. Even so, Plame took some persuading before they made an offer. "She's very frugal," explains Wilson. "My brother who's in real estate had to fly in from the West Coast and explain that a mortgage could cost less than our rented apartment in the Watergate.
Plame also told Wilson that she'd be moving with him into the new house only as his wife."
Granite countertops are a fairly new idea and considered very classy from what I gather from the Home and Garden network shows. Everyone that is anyone should have them. Considering everything else we've learned this seems to fit.
Good find. I guess the $44,000 was for a lot. Man has property escalated in value in DC since then. Your comment about granite countertops being a fairly new trend is exactly correct IMO. In fact, we bought a 7 1/2 year old house a few months ago and quickly proceeded to tear out the kitchen countertops and replace them with granite--new appliances too even though the old ones were fine.