Hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin is the proud new owner of America’s most expensive home. The Citadel founder closed the deal on his new Manhattan penthouse property at 220 Central Park South on Wednesday.

Most Expensive Home

Griffin paid a purported $238 million USD for the upmarket abode. The purchase now holds the record for the most expensive US home ever. 

The previous holder of the record for America’s most expensive home was a Hamptons pad. This sold for $137 million in 2014.

The Manhattan penthouse is nearly 24,000 square feet in size and takes up several floors at the top of an exclusive tower designed by architects Robert A.M Stern and developed by Vornado Realty Trust. 

Griffin will now be neighbors with singer Sting and his wife who also reside at the 79-story skyscraper. The building looks onto New York’s iconic Central Park and stands right in the middle of an area known as billionaires row. 

Statistics

Johnathan Miller, CEO of Miller Samuel Inc., a real estate and appraisal consulting firm that tracks America’s most expensive homes, said the apartment was actually listed at $250 million originally.

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He stated:

“The sale for $238 million has nothing to do with the current market. It has everything to do with 2015, which was around peak luxury […] In New York, the top end is softening right now because of over-development.”

Ken Griffin

Ken Griffin is the founder and CEO of Chicago-based hedge fund Citadel. According to Forbes, he has a net worth of $9.9 billion. Griffin doesn’t just spend his wealth on luxury penthouse apartments, however. He has been known to give generously to charities with estimations suggesting a figure of over $700 million USD.

He founded Citadel in 1990, after years of a trading career he established from his college dorm room at Harvard University in the ’80s. Citadel has since grown to become one of the world’s most successful hedge fund empires.

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