Hedge fund manager Nick Maounis purchased a neighboring property on La Gorce Island in Miami Beach for $31.5 million, according to a March 20 report by The Real Deal. The transaction involved a 5,400-square-foot house at 84 La Gorce Circle, which was sold by Dennery LLC. The deal closed last Thursday.
The sale is notable because it achieved one of the highest price-per-square-foot figures for land in Miami-Dade County history, with the property trading at $1,575 per square foot. STRE Management, representing the seller, said in a statement to The Real Deal that the sale was “effectively a land play” and highlighted its record-setting price metric. Another nearby home at 68 La Gorce Circle sold for $1,713 per square foot in August.
The half-acre property had been listed with Jonathan Alfonso of EXP Realty for $39 million. Ryan Mendell of Maxwell E Realty represented the buyer. Both agents declined to comment on the identity of the buyer.
Maounis and his wife previously paid $75 million for the adjacent home at 88 La Gorce Circle in May of last year, which they planned to renovate extensively. That mansion spans 21,700 square feet and sits on a one-acre lot built by Todd Michael Glaser in 2008. With both properties combined, Maounis has spent $106.5 million on 1.6 acres along La Gorce Island.
Maounis is known as the founder of Amaranth Advisors hedge fund, which collapsed in 2006 after losing more than $6 billion on natural gas futures. He currently serves as CEO of Verition Fund Management based in Greenwich, Connecticut; Bloomberg reported that Verition managed $14.4 billion at the start of this year.
In addition to his recent acquisitions on La Gorce Island, Maounis and his wife own another waterfront estate on Pine Tree Drive in Miami Beach purchased for $26 million from David and Leila Centner in 2022.
The market for luxury waterfront homes remains strong amid an influx of wealthy buyers relocating from California to Florida. Land sales are also increasing as brokers observe renewed interest among high-end buyers. Earlier this month, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan closed on their purchase of an Indian Creek mansion under construction for a record-setting $170 million.
