Former Merrill Lynch CEO snaps up condo at Surf Club Four Seasons

UPDATED September 28th, 6:15 p.m.: Earnest Stanley O’Neal, the former CEO of Merrill Lynch & Co., just paid $13 million for a unit at the Four Seasons Private Residences at The Surf Club, property records show.

The money honcho bought unit 1017 in the north tower of the luxury Surfside condo development at 9111 Collins Avenue, and financed the purchase with a $6.25 million mortgage from Wells Fargo.

O’Neal headed the wealth management company for nearly six years until it sunk at the height of the financial crisis in 2007. Before becoming a division of Bank of America, O’Neal helped Merrill amass $41 billion in subprime colaterialized debt obligations and mortgage bonds, according to Fortune.

Units at the Four Seasons Private Residences at The Surf Club range from $3.7 million to $31 million, and from 1,800 square feet to more than 7,000 square feet. Fort Partners completed the project, which includes a 77-room hotel and two 12-story residential towers, earlier this year.

The Surf Club development features a private club, two restaurants, four swimming pools, cabanas, a gym and oceanside gardens. It was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Richard Meier with Kobi Karp, and was built on the site of the former private beach club founded in 1930 by Harvey Firestone Club and designed by Russell Pancoast.

Just this week, Joseph Thomas Elbling, CEO of Digicon S.A., a maker of ATMs, paid $10.5 million for unit 401 in the south tower of the luxury condo development. Other buyers include former Esquire publisher Alan Greenberg, telecommunications tycoon Rajendra Singh and former Publix Super Markets CEO Charles Jenkins Jr.