Chicago real estate honcho buys waterfront home near North Palm Beach for $17M

The head of a Chicago-area real estate company paid $17.1 million for a waterfront home near North Palm Beach that had passed among family members via a trust for decades.

Daniel T. Van Voorhis, using an entity he manages, bought the house at 11249 Old Harbour Road along the Intracoastal Waterway, according to records. Janet A. Fruehauf and H. Richard Fruehuaf Jr., through trusts in their names, are the sellers.

Van Voorhis is president and CEO of Oak Brook, Illinois-based Continental Communities, a real estate investment firm that was founded in 1997, according to his LinkedIn.

H. Richard Fruehauf Jr., heads Master Key Energy LLC, an oil and gas business based in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, according to published reports.

The 6,445-square-foot house was built in 1967, and has five bedrooms, six full bathrooms, one half-bathroom and a dock, according to Realtor.com.

The home last sold in November 2020, when the Fruehaufs paid $6.12 million to the family trust for an undivided 80 percent of the property. Property records show the house had remained within the family trust since 1995, when Fruehuaf family members first bought the property for $2.5 million.

Over the years, the Fruehaufs have made multiple improvements to the property, including reroofing in 2020 and installing a boat lift in 2009, records show.

The sale marks the latest in Palm Beach County’s high-priced residential market.

Home and condo sales in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties of $10 million and up, from December 2020 to November 2021, topped that of the previous two years combined, according to an analysis by The Real Deal.

In April, retired hockey player Brad Richards paid $8.1 million for a lakefront home at 11975 Lost Tree Way in North Palm Beach.

Also in April, billionaire Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle Corp., paid $80 million for the estate at 12525 Seminole Beach Road in North Palm Beach.