Hedge funder revealed as buyer of $105M Ford estate

Greg Coffey purchased palatial Southampton home

Greg Coffey and 90 Jule Pond Drive in Southampton (Sotheby's)
Greg Coffey and 90 Jule Pond Drive in Southampton (Sotheby's)

Months after a Southampton estate formerly belonging to Henry Ford II changed hands, the buyer of the palatial pad has finally been revealed.

Australian hedge fund manager Greg Coffey was behind the $105 million purchase, the Wall Street Journal reported. The 50-year-old Coffey made his money as a trader at GLG and co-chief investment officer at Moore Capital Management. He runs Kirkoswald Asset Management out of New York.

90 Jule Pond Drive in Southampton (Sotheby’s)

Brenda Earl, a portfolio manager and former partner at Zweig-Dimenna, was the seller of the estate. Earl purchased the property from Italian financier Carlo Traglio for $21.75 million in 2002.

In August 2017, Earl listed the 42-acre estate at a significantly higher price of $175 million before cutting the ask down to $145 million two years later. The final closing price is still one of the most expensive in the history of the Hamptons.

The property was once part of a 235-acre estate owned by Henry Ford’s grandson. After the younger Ford divorced Anne McDonnell, she gained control of the property and broke it into smaller parcels, including the 20,000-square-foot home at 90 Jule Pond Drive.

90 Jule Pond Drive in Southampton (Sotheby’s)

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Coffey’s new Hamptons home includes 12 bedrooms and 12 bathrooms, more than 1,200 linear feet of ocean frontage and access to three ponds. Other amenities include a heated gunite pool, a spa, an outdoor kitchen, outdoor shower, tennis court and basketball court.

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The listing was shared by Cody and Zachary Vichinsky of Bespoke, Ellen Stern of William Pitt and Julia B. Fee of Sotheby’s International Realty.

Coffey was previously rumored to be the buyer for an Upper East Side townhouse, which set a residential record when it traded in 2019 for $77 million. John Griffin, a fellow hedge funder, ultimately proved to be the buyer.

While Coffey missed out on that property, the Journal reported he was the buyer of a different Upper East Side townhouse, which sold for $53.5 million last year. The sale came courtesy of real estate investor David Levinson, who parted ways with a row house at 11 East 69th Street, surpassing Jeffrey Epstein’s former mansion as the biggest townhouse sale of 2021 at the mid-year point.

[WSJ] — Holden Walter-Warner