Last priced at $75M, mansion with complex history changes hands near Palm Beach, buyer says
Developed on speculation, a recently completed mega-mansion at 1460 S. Ocean Blvd. in Manalapan near Palm Beach has seen a transfer of ownership, the Palm Beach Daily News has confirmed. Although the amount that changed hands in the off-market deal has not been disclosed, the ocean-to-lake estate was last listed for sale at $74.95 million.
Private-equity specialist and developer Vivian Dimond’s Bayshore Grove Capital in Miami-Dade County is on the buyer’s side of the deal, according to an Aug. 2 story in The Real Deal Miami, which was the first media outlet to report the sale and buyer.
Dimond’s company plans to re-list the estate for sale, she told the Palm Beach Daily News in an Aug. 4 phone interview. But she has not finalized the timeframe or the asking price, she said.
Dimond did not disclose the amount that changed hands.
The contemporary-style mansion has six bedrooms and 25,576 square feet of living space, inside and out, according to a previous sales listing. Of that measurement, nearly 20,000 square feet is air-conditioned space.
With 172 feet of ocean and lake frontage, the lot measures 1½ acres and is about a mile north of the Boynton Beach Inlet.
The sale was structured so that Bayshore Grove Capital purchased London Financial South Ocean LLC, the Florida limited liability company that had owned the estate since late last year, Dimond told the Palm Beach Daily News.
The Palm Beach County Clerk’s office has not recorded a deed for the transaction. It’s not clear if the price will be documented at the courthouse because of the way the transaction was structured.
As late as July 24, the multiple listing service showed the property was under contract, with an expected closing date of July 31. But that listing was later canceled.
The estate had been co-listed by agents Joseph Liguori, Pascal Liguori and Carmen N. D’Angelo Jr. of Premier Estate Properties. Pascal Liguori declined to comment on behalf of Premier Estate Properties.
Construction on the estate has only recently been completed, Dimond said.
With a complex history, the estate had first entered the market more than two years ago, MLS records show. At one point, it was listed for sale at $87.5 million.
Before it was purchased by Dimond's company, London Financial South Ocean LLC of Key Biscayne was co-managed by I. Edward London and Edward T. London, state business records show. Edward London’s LinkedIn profile describes his profession as a “hard money lender” and a “South Florida loan specialist” at London Financial Co., where he holds the title executive vice president. He and I. Edward London could not be reached for comment.
In December, London Financial South Ocean LLC bought the still-unfinished Manalapan estate, which was then in financial distress, for $21.5 million, courthouse records show. A couple of months before that sale, London Financial South Ocean LLC filed a foreclosure suit against the previous owner related to an unpaid mortgage worth millions of dollars. In April, a 15th Circuit Court judge approved a joint agreement between the two parties to settle the case.
Mansion near Palm Beach was designed with a long list of amenities
The bulk of the estate is on the beach side of South Ocean Boulevard. On the opposite of the coastal road is a narrow lakefront parcel and a deep-water dock.
With two stories and a service level below ground, the house was designed with a long list of amenities, including a “wellness center” with an indoor swimming pool and a glass roof, according to plans submitted to the town and previous sales listings. The plans also included a two-story reception room, a “floating” staircase, a catering kitchen, a 12-car garage and a wing with two VIP guest suites.
The house was designed by Affiniti Architects of Boca Raton with architecture “reminiscent of streamlined Bauhaus” design, the sales listing says. The lakeside façade was designed with streamlined columns of exotic ipe wood. On the east side, large expanses of glass showcase ocean views.
On the second floor, the primary bedroom wing was designed with a salon and sitting room. Plans showed the second level would also have three bedrooms with views of the waterway, a home theater and a game room.
Outside are a second swimming pool and a children’s play area. A planned tennis court was never built but the land for it remains undeveloped.
Dimond told the Palm Beach Daily News the estate is her company's first purchase in Palm Beach County.
Dimond has more than 30 years of experience in real estate marketing and sales, construction, property management, and residential and commercial financing and development, according to biographical sketches on the websites of Bayshore Grove Capital and Brown Harris Stevens. In 2017, she sold her majority stake in Avatar Real Estate Services to Brown Harris Stevens, where she is a Miami regional broker for the agency.
Her portfolio of businesses and developments has included Dimond Development, Bayshore Grove Management, The Executive Suites at Grand Bay Plaza and Auker Development. She also founded Aman Capital Group.
Spec house near Palm Beach had a troubled history under its original owner
Before the sale of the Manalapan estate in December, construction had been repeatedly delayed over several years at the site, much to the consternation of town officials, the Palm Beach Daily News previously reported. The first building permit was issued by the town in 2018. Since then, the Town Commission granted multiple requests for time extensions on the permit.
Last fall, court records show, London Financial South Ocean LLC filed its foreclosure suit. As of Oct. 6, 2023, the lawsuit said, the lender was owed $20.8 million — as specified in mortgage and other loan documents — along with accruing interest.
At the time the foreclosure suit was filed, the estate was owned by an entity managed by oil-and-energy businessman Onajite Okoloko, business records show. His company had bought the Manalapan property for a recorded $12.45 million in 2017 when the property was vacant and pursued plans to develop the mansion.
The foreclosure suit named Okoloko as a defendant and said he defaulted as the borrower after guaranteeing payment of the loan linked to the mortgage.
In March 2023, I. Edward London signed, as a manager of London Financial South Ocean LLC, a “mortgage modification and notice of future advance agreement,” courthouse records show. The mortgage document said the borrower on the property owed $28.25 million, including a principal amount of $17.25 million and another $11 million in future advances.
Manalapan saw real estate prices soar over the past few years
Although sales in Manalapan have slowed over the past year, asking prices for premium properties remain far higher than before the coronavirus pandemic-sparked the real estate boom that arrived in the town in early 2021, real estate observers say.
The boom came, in part, because some homebuyers bought in Manalapan after they couldn’t find waterfront estates in Palm Beach, where housing inventory shrank dramatically during the first years of the pandemic. The housing boom also was fueled by the work-at-home trend and Florida’s favorable tax climate.
Manalapan also is the town with the highest average home price in the country, according to a report released in April by financial-services company CashNetUSA. Using price data from the real estate website Zillow, analysts added up “house prices in each area and divided them by the number of properties to calculate the average price in every neighborhood,” a statement accompanying the report said.
The average price of a house in Manalapan was $39.76 million — but that figure was skewed by a whopper of an outlying sale, the analysts noted. That $173 million sale in June 2022 of a 22-acre estate at 2000 S. Ocean Blvd., on the south end of town, set a new Florida residential record.
This is a developing story. Check back for any updates. Portions of this story appeared previously in the Palm Beach Daily News.
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. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: 'Spec' mansion once listed at $75M near Palm Beach finds a buyer
