50 Eggs restaurateur John Kunkel buys waterfront Miami Beach home

Kunkel’s restaurants include Yardbird in Miami Beach, Chica in Miami and Wakuda in Las Vegas and Singapore.

John Howard Kunkel with 1030 Stillwater Drive (LinkedIn, Google Maps)
John Howard Kunkel with 1030 Stillwater Drive (LinkedIn, Google Maps)

John Kunkel, founder and CEO of 50 Eggs Hospitality Group, bought a waterfront Miami Beach home for $6.8 million.

Records show Kunkel bought the 4,477-square-foot house at 1030 Stillwater Drive from Silvana Rodrigues and David Albin. Kunkel secured a $4.7 million loan from City National Bank of Florida to finance the purchase.

Miami-based 50 Eggs’ popular restaurants include Yardbird Table & Bar in Miami Beach, Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, Las Vegas, Washington, D.C. and Singapore; Chica in Miami, Las Vegas and Aspen; and Wakuda in Las Vegas and Singapore. Yardbird also plans to open soon in Denver and Chicago, according to 50 Eggs’ website.

Rodrigues is a real estate agent with Sharp Realty. Records show she bought the property with then-husband Roberto Rodrigues in 1994 for $300,000. A previous house on the 0.2-acre property was built in 1949. In 2012, the current five-bedroom, four-bathroom house was built, according to Realtor.com.

Sign Up for the undefined Newsletter

Realtor.com shows the property has been listed for sale on and off over the years, most recently asking $3.5 million in 2020. It was not listed at the time that Kunkel bought the property.

Kunkel is a longtime Miami Beach resident. Records show that in 2005, Kunkel bought a house at 1398 Bay Drive in Miami Beach with his ex-wife, Jennifer Alison Kunkel, for $1.6 million. Their renovation of the home was featured on an episode of My Big Amazing Renovation on HGTV. The couple’s divorce was finalized in 2020, and John Kunkel was removed from the deed that year.

While Miami Beach’s pandemic-fueled frenzy has begun to cool, demand for waterfront homes remains strong. Last month, spec developer Todd Glaser and his partners bought a 0.5 acre waterfront lot on Allison Island for $7.9 million, with plans to build a 10,000-square-foot mid-century modern mansion. That same month, relatives of Bal Harbour Shops founder Stanley Whitman sold a waterfront house in Miami Beach for $9.5 million.

Other buyers are turning to non-waterfront properties in the area. Major Food Group co-founder Mario Carbone just paid $4.3 million for a non-waterfront home on Miami Beach’s Palm Island.

Read more