Silicon Valley developer pays $29M for a Bel Air teardown

Developer David Dollinger has picked up a piece of Bel Air for himself for $29 million.

The Dollinger Properties principal is the new owner of a 1.42-acre property on Sarbonne Road, according to Yolanda’s Little Black Book.

The site is home to a roughly 7,000-square-foot mansion dating from 1938. But the property’s new construction potential may have attracted the developer. A listing calls it “ideal to build your dream home,” and says the purchase comes with various soil and geographic reports needed to develop it.

The current home was owned for 20 years by Robert H. Blumenfield, himself a developer and an art collector. Blumenfield bought it back in 1998 for $4 million, and then in 2016 he moved nearby to a 20,000-square-foot mansion near the Bel Air Country Club, according to Yolanda.

Dollinger is from Silicon Valley, where his development company is headquartered, and he already owns a home near Palo Alto. In 2017 he married Beverly Hills-based yoga instructor and Instagram celebrity Tara Juergens, who is now Tara Dollinger.

Teardowns are not uncommon in Bel Air. A new crop of mega-rich residents are slowly replacing older homes with new behemoths kitted out with the most modern amenities.

Actress Joanne Carson’s former home in the neighborhood is up for sale as a teardown with plans in place for a 12,000-square-foot mansion. Actress Salma Hayek filed plans last month to double her living space in Bel Air with a new mansion. [Yolanda’s Little Black Book] — Dennis Lynch