Waterfront mansion just sold for $27.5M near Palm Beach likely a tear-down, buyer says

Darrell Hofheinz, Palm Beach Daily News
Updated ·5 min read

A sizable mansion on an ocean-to-lake estate that just sold for a recorded $27.5 million is likely a tear-down, according to the developer whose company bought the property in the wealthy town of Manalapan near Palm Beach.

Real estate investor and former Manalapan Mayor Stewart A. Satter hasn’t finalized his plans for the property but told the Palm Beach Daily News he expects to demolish the 1980s-era mansion and redevelop at least part of the land with a speculative house for sale at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. on the far south end of town.

Satter manages the limited liability company on the buyer’s side of the sale, which closed Monday.

Measuring 3.9 acres, the estate comprises one of the largest sea-to-lake parcels in town.

Built in 1989, the nine-bedroom mansion has 35,341 square feet of living space, indoors and out, according to its sales listing. About 11,873 of the residential space is air-conditioned, property records show.

A company controlled by developer and former Manalapan Mayor Stewart A. Satter has purchased this estate at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan for a recorded $27.5 million. Satter says he expects to tear down the 1989 mansion and redevelop the property.
A company controlled by developer and former Manalapan Mayor Stewart A. Satter has purchased this estate at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan for a recorded $27.5 million. Satter says he expects to tear down the 1989 mansion and redevelop the property.

The property was sold by the Florida limited liability company that bought it for a recorded $20.45 million three years ago.

“It’s an extraordinary piece of land,” said Satter, who has developed and sold other houses in Manalapan through his Carnegie Hill Development Corp. In December, he resigned as mayor from the Town Commission — along with four other commissioners — in response, he said, to a new state financial-disclosure law that demands elected officials reveal the worth of their assets in detail.

Developer Stewart A. Satter is a former mayor of Manalapan near Palm Beach.
Developer Stewart A. Satter is a former mayor of Manalapan near Palm Beach.

The estate that just changed hands includes a mostly vacant oceanfront parcel and, on the opposite side of the coastal road, a smaller lakeside parcel where the mansion stands. With dramatic water views, the property has 350 feet of ocean frontage and another 350 feet of lakefront with a deepwater dock.

The estate also has a roadside tunnel from the lake parcel to the beach parcel and cabana. The estate is among only a handful in Manalapan with a tunnel to the beach. There’s also a lakefront swimming pool.

The property abuts to the south an ocean-to-lake estate that sold for a recorded $173 million in June 2022 to an entity controlled by software billionaire Larry Ellison of Oracle Corp. In all, Ellison’s estate measures about 22 acres, including a slice of nearby Bird Island.

In the just-closed sale involving Satter, agents Nick Malinosky and Gary Pohrer of Douglas Elliman Real Estate handled both sides the transaction, Pohrer confirmed before declining further comment.

On the seller’s side was real estate attorney Maura Ziska as manager of 1960 South Ocean LLC, the deed recorded Tuesday shows. She also declined to comment.

Seen in the foreground, an ocean-to-lake estate at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan near Palm Beach has 350 feet of waterfront on both sides. The property, which measures nearly 4 acres, just sold for a recorded $27.5 million.
Seen in the foreground, an ocean-to-lake estate at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan near Palm Beach has 350 feet of waterfront on both sides. The property, which measures nearly 4 acres, just sold for a recorded $27.5 million.

Buyer had his eye on estate near Palm Beach for years

The tri-level mansion includes a home theater, an expansive primary suite and multiple garages that can accommodate at least 20 cars, the sales listing said.

Satter said he had had his eye on the estate since 2017, when it was being marketed for sale by its original owner, Tom Gerrard, who ended up selling the property at auction in 2018 for a recorded $13.5 million. The highest bidder was a company associated with Texas businesswoman Jean Christine Thompson, who sold it in 2021 to the company Ziska manages.

Satter again considered buying when it was on the market in 2021 but “the timing wasn’t right for me,” he said.

He added: “So I’m very excited now to have acquired the property.”

The Mediterranean-style house at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan south of Palm Beach was built in 1989.
The Mediterranean-style house at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan south of Palm Beach was built in 1989.

Satter’s purchase, he said, came together quickly, once the seller dropped the asking price from $38 million to $32 million. That price reduction occurred on Feb. 19, according the multiple listing service.

“After a quick back and forth between myself and the seller, we settled on a price of $27.5 (million),” Satter said.

He outlined several speculative options for the property once the mansion is demolished. He might build one large house on the land, he said, or subdivide the estate and develop a house immediately on one of the two parcels. He would also entertain reselling the entire estate as is “if someone wanted to buy it.”

In the neighborhood where the house just sold, Manalapan’s zoning rules only allow full-size residences to be built on the lake parcels. Much smaller beach houses or cabanas can be built on the beachfront.

A boardwalk leads across the dune to the shore at an ocean-to-lake estate at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan near Palm Beach. The oceanfront parcel makes up the bulk of the estate, which just sold for a recorded $27.5 million.
A boardwalk leads across the dune to the shore at an ocean-to-lake estate at 1960 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan near Palm Beach. The oceanfront parcel makes up the bulk of the estate, which just sold for a recorded $27.5 million.

Satter has developed, sold other properties in Manalapan

Satter has developed four other houses in Manalapan, including an estate he shares with his wife, Susan, on South Ocean Boulevard. The couple has lived in the town since 2004.

In April 2022, his company sold, for a recorded $40 million, a vacant lot of 1.5 acres at 1260 S. Ocean Blvd. That deal included town-approved house plans and building permits for a 27,500-square-foot mansion, which today is nearing completion. On the buyer’s side of the 2022 ocean-to-lake sale was an entity linked to billionaire Mary Alice Dorrance Malone, heiress to the Campbell Soup fortune.

In December 2020, Satter sold, for a recorded $38.875 million, a six-bedroom house at 1660 S. Ocean Blvd. that his company had developed next to his own home. At the time, that sale ranked among the biggest-dollar home deals ever in Manalapan and was the town’s biggest direct-lakefront sale, according to deals recorded in the MLS. The buyers were Ron and Cindy McMackin, who the same month sold their Palm Beach lakefront house at 1480 N. Lake Way to a trust affiliated with Hollywood icon Sylvester Stallone.

The house Satter sold at 1660 S. Ocean Blvd. was built by RWB Construction, the contractor for all of his Manalapan projects. The same company would build any new house on the property he just bought, Satter said.

Satter is the former president and CEO of Consumer Testing Laboratories, a group of independent labs specializing in testing and analyzing consumer products for U.S. retailers. The company was sold to Underwriters Laboratory in 2016. He also is the founding principal partner of New York City-based NYU Stern School of Business Endless Frontier Labs, a science and technology startup accelerator; and a former partner of City Light Capital, a social venture firm in New York City.

dhofheinz@pbdailynews.com

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This story was updated March 12, 2024, the day the deed for the sale of 1960 S. Ocean Blvd in Manalapan was recorded at the Palm Beach County Courthouse.

Darrell Hofheinz is a USA TODAY Network of Florida journalist who writes about Palm Beach real estate in his weekly “Beyond the Hedges” column. He welcomes tips about real estate news on the island. Email dhofheinz@pbdailynews.com, call 561-820-3831 or tweet @PBDN_Hofheinz

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Estate sold for millions near Palm Beach is a tear-down, buyer says