A sprawling estate in the wealthy northern California town of Woodside has sold for $117.5 million, making it the most expensive on record for a residential property in the United States,
Forbes reported.
The sale surpasses the previous Silicon Valley record of $100 million, which Russian investor Yuri Milner paid for a home in 2011, according to the San Jose Mercury News.
It also tops the $103 million paid for an undeveloped 40-acre land parcel in East Hampton, N.Y., by billionaire Ron Baron in 2007, according to Forbes.
The Valley, known as a high-tech startup haven for businessmen, is also home to billionaires like Oracle Corp. chief Larry Ellison.
The private sale of the Woodside estate was closed in November between the owner, private equity investor Tully M. Friedman, and an undisclosed buyer represented by SV Projects, according to public records.
Though it is not known for certain, The Los Angeles Times suggested Japan‘s second-richest man, Masayoshi Son, is the super-secretive buyer.
The chief executive of telecom giant Softbank, Forbes estimates Son is worth $7.2 billion. His company made headlines in October with its plans to acquire 70 percent of Sprint Nextel for $20.1 billion.
The multi-million-dollar home is a neoclassical structure that was designed by Virginia architect Allan Greenberg. His website describes it as "sitting in an elaborate hilltop garden" and "reflecting the strong Palladian tradition in the United States."
The home also features a large, elliptical garden room, a pool, and a 1,117-square-foot colonnaded pool house overlooking wooded hills. The home has 8,930 square feet, and the cost per square foot is $13,158.
The sale comes as Silicon Valley luxury home sales surged 54 percent in December, according to residential brokerage Coldwell Banker, said the News. Coldwell Banker is rumored to have represented the seller.
A founding partner of San Francisco-based private investment firm Hellman & Friedman, Friedman is now chief executive officer of Friedman, Fleischer and Lowe, a private equity firm in San Francisco, according to the San Jose Mercury News. A Stanford University undergraduate and Harvard Law School graduate, Friedman is a past president of the San Francisco Opera Association and is a director of the Telluride Foundation.