Mark Zuckerberg snags $23M D.C. property in all-cash sale
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Mark Zuckerberg at President Trump's January inauguration. Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Mark Zuckerberg will be spending more time in D.C. after he paid $23 million in cash for a home in the tony Woodland Normanstone neighborhood, Politico reports.
Why it matters: The purchase indicates a heightened interest in D.C. from the private sector, with bigwig CEOs seeing a Beltway property as a "personal embassy" from which they can court the Trump administration, Politico's Michael Schaffer writes.
The big picture: Zuckerberg is one of several tech titans to buy D.C. digs — a cohort that featured prominently in President Trump's latest inauguration.
- Recent transactions include: AI and crypto czar David Sacks picking up a $10.3 million penthouse in Northwest, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt buying a $15 million Georgetown pad, and former eBay president Jeff Skoll snagging a $17 million compound in McLean.
- And, of course, Jeff Bezos has his $23 million Kalorama mansion, and Peter Thiel his $13 million outpost in the same neighborhood as Zuckerberg.
State of play: The private, all-cash sale is tied for the third-most-expensive in D.C.'s history, reports the Washington Business Journal.
- There's hardly any public information available about the sale, which was made between two trusts.
The intrigue: Flight tracking data showed Zuckerberg's private plane landing at Dulles on Monday, reports Politico, and neighbors of the D.C. home subsequently reported it looked occupied after months of mostly sitting empty.
- Zuckerberg then appeared at the White House on Wednesday.
What they're saying: A Meta spokesperson confirmed to Politico that Zuckerberg had purchased a home in the District, "which will allow Mark to spend more time there as Meta continues the work on policy issues related to American technology leadership."
- "These CEOs have such vast fortunes that purchasing a home in D.C., even if they're overpaying, even if it's not a great investment at the price they're paying, it doesn't really matter," real estate agent Jennifer Knoll told Politico. "The benefits they can reap from relationships with the government can make up for any loss from a bad real estate deal."