Fiji Water founder quenched his thirst with $45M sale of Palm Beach mansion

The founder of Fiji Water found a buyer thirsty enough to pay $44.9 million for his Palm Beach estate.

Fiji founder David Gilmour and his wife, Jillian, sold the 7,942-square-foot home at 5 Golfview Road to a Delaware company managed by Alley, Maass, Rogers & Lindsay shareholder M. Timothy Hanlon. The buyer financed the purchase with a $24.9 million loan from Citibank.

The non-waterfront Palm Beach property is surrounded by the Everglades Golf Course, which is waterfront.

The five-bedroom, seven-bathroom and one half-bath home was built in 1935 on a half-acre lot. It includes a pool.

David Gilmour and his wife had claimed homestead exemption on the property. He paid about $3.8 million for the house in 1997.

Gilmour, a Canadian businessman, created Dansk Design, and founded the hotel chain Southern Pacific Hotel Corp. that he started in Fiji. He co-founded Fiji Water in 1996 with Peter Munk. He and Munk also purchased Zinio, a digital magazine company.

The house traded in an off-market deal, which is becoming more common as Palm Beach reports record low inventory. Luxury home sales on the island have soared since local pandemic lockdowns were lifted in the summer of 2020. Palm Beach sales set new records for waterfront and non-waterfront deals.

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The head of a Chicago-area real estate firm recently flipped a renovated Palm Beach home for $15.5 million, $6.2 million more than his purchase price less than a year ago.

Developers like Todd Michael Glaser continue to bet on the market. In February, Glaser and his partners bought a waterfront Palm Beach mansion for $53 million with plans to expand it and relist it for $115 million.

Also in February, Sabatello Construction, another spec homebuilder, bought an oceanfront Palm Beach lot for $39 million.