A Minnesota medical device scion whose family is credited with spurring on the state’s medical technology industry sold his Wellington estate for $5.5 million.
John Fleischhacker and his wife, Daveanna, sold the 3.6-acre property for $400 per square foot, records show.
The estate is located at 14136 Equestrian Way and has four bedrooms and three-and-a-half bathrooms. The buyer is a Florida company, Hermitage Farm South LLC, records show.
The Fleischhacker family founded Lake Region Medical which was a major supplier of pacemaker parts to Medtronic, the largest medical device company in the world.
Fleischhacker left the family company in 1974 to start another medical device firm, Daig Corp, which he sold in 1996 to St. Jude Medical for a reported $427.5 million, according to the Star Tribune.
The listing agent for the estate was Travis Laas of Engel & Volkers Wellington. The buyer was represented by Roberta Feinberg of Illustrated Properties.
Feinberg said the buyer is an equestrian rider who purchased the site to be close to the Winter Equestrian Festival. Previously, he or she was renting a site and chose to buy instead.
The estate was last purchased for $7.5 million in March 2017, meaning the property sold for a 26 percent discount from its last sales price.
14136 Equestrian Way (Credit: Zillow)
The estate includes a 14-stall barn with a two-bedroom, two-bathroom guest house or grooms quarter. It also includes a fully fenced backyard with a covered patio and a pool.
Last November, a Chicago-based company tied to billionaire J.B. Pritzker, the governor-elect of Illinois, bought another equestrian estate in Wellington from the Fleischhackers. The estate at 3202 Grand Prix Farms Drive sold for $12.1 million.
Wellington, a small town in central Palm Beach County, is regarded as the equestrian capital of the United States. It hosts the Winter Equestrian Festival every year at the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center, which brings some of the top riders in the world to South Florida.
Many wealthy celebrities have bought estates in the area. In 2018, Billy Joel bought a horse ranch in Wellington for $3.5 million. Joel, 68, bought the five-acre ranch for his fourth wife, 36-year-old Alexis Roderick, an experienced equestrian rider.