Tech entrepreneurs trade Los Gatos’ priciest home of year

The head of electric vehicle infrastructure company ChargePoint has purchased a 1-acre estate in Los Gatos for $8.2 million, making it this year’s priciest single-family home sale in the Silicon Valley town.

Chargepoint is publicly traded with a market value of more than $6 billion.

A trust whose sole trustee is Pasquale Romano, CEO of Campbell-based ChargePoint, bought the property at 16110 Matilija Drive from Andrii Grebin and his wife Svitlana, documents filed with the Santa Clara County Clerk-Recorder’s Office on Sept. 2 show. Andrii Grebin is the CEO of Nautech Corp., a San Jose-based tech consulting company.

The price works out to about $1,051 a square foot of living space.

Compass represented both sides of the deal. Michael Nevis and Rick Ardizzone marketed the home for sale, while George Montanari was the buyer’s agent. Compass and Romano didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The fact that the $8.2 million sale was the priciest in Los Gatos this year underlines how rising interest rates and an uncertain economic climate have impacted the town’s high-end residence market. Along a half-mile stretch of Matilija Drive, three other homes sold last year for more than the one Romano purchased on an absolute and a per-square-foot basis, according to Zillow data. The slowdown has affected the entire Bay Area, which saw the biggest year-over-year declines in home price and sales volume among U.S. metro markets, according to an August Redfin report.

The house at 16110 Matilija Drive comes with four bedrooms and seven full and half baths. Completed in 2015, it includes a home theater, wine room, gym, art studio and library, according to Compass’ website. Other features include heated floors, lighted walkways, custom fire pits and a covered patio with overhead heaters.

Besides his role at ChargePoint, Romano co-owns an Italian restaurant in downtown Los Gatos named Centonove with his wife, Andrea. He was recently appointed by the Biden administration to the National Infrastructure Advisory Council, which advises the president on cybersecurity risks and the security of the nation’s infrastructure.

Romano already owned a home in Los Gatos before buying the Matilija Drive estate, title service records show. The trust that shares his name acquired a 3,400-square-foot residence on Blueberry Hill Drive in 2009 for $1.9 million, those records show. The three-bed, three-bath home is less than half the size and four miles east of the one he recently purchased.

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