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Citadel CEO Ken Griffin has offloaded his unfinished Chicago penthouse for $11 million, as he and his family continue to settle their new life in Miami.
The billionaire has let go of the 38th-floor penthouse at a significant loss, according to various reports. In 2017, Griffin bought the unit at 9 West Walton for $21.2 million, which means if the sale closes near the $11 million asking price, he will have lost more than 10 million on the deal.
Before he swore off Chicago, Griffin put a pretty penny toward investing in the luxury building on the Gold Coast, spending $58.5 million on units across four flours in 2018, marking the largest resident real estate deal in Chicago history.
Griffin’s efforts at selling his other units in the building have not been fruitful so far, as Chicago’s luxury market has largely lagged behind other hot metros right now. Just days after the 38th-floor unit secured a buyer, Griffin put the 37th-floor unit on the market for $9 million, according to The Real Deal, which is also several million less than the $12.7 million he paid for it in 2018.
Griffin has also faced losses on the sales of other Chicago properties he owned, including a total loss of $6.9 million on two other properties he sold at the Waldorf Astoria Chicago and Park Tower.
Even with those losses, Griffin’s investments in Florida are proving fruitful thus far, according to one of his spokespersons.
“While the value of Ken’s properties in his former hometown may have declined, thankfully it is only a small loss compared to the appreciation he’s enjoyed on his property investments in Florida,” Zia Ahmed told Bloomberg.
The hedge funder, whose net worth is around $43 billion, according to Forbes, announced Citadel would be moving its headquarters to Miami in 2022. In the last few years, Griffin has invested around $300 million in real estate in the area, including $107 million for an estate in Coconut Grove.
Griffin is also reportedly in the midst of constructing what may become the most expensive property in the world, located in Palm Beach, The New York Post reported.
“If he spent nearly half a billion to buy up acres of land in Palm Beach over the last decade and is expected to spend $150 million more to build an entirely new home, that piece of property is worth at least $1 billion now,” one industry expert told The Post.
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