Boston Suburb Home Sells for Record $18M

It’s not Beverly Hills, but homes in Beverly, a suburb of Boston, can still fetch a glamorous price.

A waterfront mansion in the Massachusetts city was recently sold for $18.3 million, Boston.com reported. The home sale was the priciest in the history of the city.

The seaside mansion at 34 Paine Avenue is massive, spanning 27,000 square feet across 3 acres. There are a staggering 34 rooms at the Georgian Revival estate, including 11 bedrooms, 11 bathrooms and three half-bathrooms.

The property is known as “Rock Edge” because of its placement above the stony shore, overlooking Beverly Harbor. The estate is attached to a private beach where deeded access is only given to five families.

Rock Edge has been restored and renovated to include high-end finishes while retaining the integrity and many original characteristics of the home. Linda Zarifi designed the property’s interior.

Two years ago, the home was listed for $22 million, the first time it had been put on the open market in a half-century. While seller Charlie Benevento didn’t receive that ask in the sale, it still traded for more than $11 million greater than the previous sale record for a single-family home in Beverly, excluding off-market transactions.

Douglas Elliman’s George Sarkis represented Benevento in the sale. Campion & Co.’s Tracy Campion represented the undisclosed buyer.

One famous owner of the home was all-around athlete and tennis star Eleonora Sears, who won five Grand Slam doubles titles during her career and made the U.S. Open finals as a singles player. She was enshrined in the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1968, the same year as her death.

The Benevento family, which accumulated its wealth from a construction and recycling business, purchased the home in 1971, according to Dirt.com. It was passed on to Charlie after the death of his mother in 2015.

— Holden Walter-Warner