Mexican billionaire cuts ask on Mag Mile condo after St. Regis buy

Grupo Mexico CEO and billionaire German Larrea is aiming to nearly double his money a condo listing at Streeterville’s Ritz Carlton Residences–even after slicing another 15 percent from as he settles into a new pad on the Mag Mile.

The 38th-floor, 3,500-square-foot condo at 118 East Erie Street went back on the market on Friday for $6.75 million. That’s down from the $7.25 million that Larrea–whose company is a key copper producer globally–sought as recently as June before yanking the listing.

The property was originally listed for $8 million in 2019 and has been on and off the market several times since. Rachel Vecchio of Dream Town Realty remains the listing agent.

Larrea’s price cut at the unit follows his September purchase of one of Chicago’s priciest condos in history: A four-bedroom, five-bathroom condo on the 71st-floor of the St. Regis on Wacker Drive that he bought for $20.6 million. Vecchio also represented him on that deal.

While fellow billionaire and former richest Chicagoan Ken Griffin–he now calls Florida home– paid $58 million for a package of condos at 9 West Walton Street in 2017 in a deal considered Chicago’s most expensive residential sale ever, only one of the condo units involved was valued at a price exceeding Larrea’s splurge on the St. Regis.

Back in Streeterville, Larrea’s series of price cuts over several years reflect a strategy high-end sellers have frequently employed in Chicago in recent years. Amid a sagging market for existing units, sellers have found themselves seeking high prices that, in some cases, would more than double the value of their properties from when they bought them. Often, however, they would end up closer to the last sale price than the ask after making concessions to strike a deal when listings have sat on the market for long periods. Vecchio didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Even as buyers have negotiated significant discounts from listing prices, they’ve absorbed a record number of luxury homes in Chicago in the last two years. Overall, 2022 was another banner year for high-end Chicago real estate. While the market lost some steam from 2021’s super-hot run–a record 66 sales closed at $4 million or more–2022 nearly matched the pace with 58 such sales, the second-best year for the high-end market in the city.

Larrea paid $3.57 million for the three-bedroom, four-bathroom unit spanning a half-floor of the Ritz Carlton building, which was completed in 2012 as part of a $240 million project that marked the first highrise to be built on the Magnificent Mile in more than a decade at the time.

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