Wolf Von Falkenburg, the widower of a Standard Oil heiress, sold a waterfront West Palm Beach estate to an affiliate of Related Group for $16 million.
Property records show Von Falkenburg sold the property at 4906 North Flagler Drive to a Florida entity named after the address and registered to PRH Investments LLC, an affiliate of Miami-based Related. The entity is led by Related Chairman and CEO Jorge Pérez, with an address at Related’s Coconut Grove headquarters, according to corporate records.
Gary Pohrer of Douglas Elliman represented the seller, and the buyer did not use an agent. Pohrer did not respond to requests for comment.
Related executives declined to comment on the purchase or plans for the property.
The 1.2-acre property features 100 feet of water frontage, a 7,253-square-foot main house with five bedrooms and four bathrooms, and two smaller cottages, according to Realtor.com. One of the cottages has three bedrooms and one bathroom, the other has one bedroom and one bathroom. The property also has a pool and dock. The main house was built in 1949, records show.
Von Falkenburg grew up in post-World War II Germany and married Anne Terry Pierce McBride, heiress to her stepfather’s Standard Oil fortune, in 1982, according to the Palm Beach Post. The pair divorced in1989 and remarried in a contested deathbed wedding just days before she passed in 2005. Last minute changes in McBride’s will left her entire estate to Von Falkenburg, including a portfolio of properties in Palm Beach, the Palm Beach Post reported. Records show Von Falkenburg has since sold off a number of the properties, including an oceanfront North Ocean Boulevard home for $5.8 million to Pohrer in November.
Records show Von Falkenburg bought the North Flagler Drive estate in 2013 for $2.8 million. In the years he owned the property, two men died of opioid overdoses at the home, one in 2015 and the other in 2016, the Palm Beach Post reported.
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For Related Group, the acquisition of a single-family home is an atypical purchase. The developer is best known for its luxury towers dotting the Miami skyline, and is expanding in Palm Beach County. It broke ground on the two-tower Icon Marina Village multifamily development in West Palm Beach last year. Investors in the project sued Related in Miami-Dade Circuit Court in April, alleging the developer cheated them out of $13 million.
A pandemic-inspired migration of investment firms to West Palm Beach has driven demand for housing and boosted prices for homes in the area, while also attracting developers. The city’s luxury market, similar to the rest of South Florida, has seen prices soar for waterfront properties.
In August, shoe mogul Marc Fisher bought a waterfront West Palm Beach mansion for $10.5 million. New York-based developer Michael Joseph bought a waterfront spec home next door to Fisher for a record $15.9 million just a few months later. In December, tennis star Anna Kournikova’s mother flipped a West Palm Beach home for $6 million, more than triple her purchase price a year earlier.