Designer and media mogul couple sell Palm Beach estate for $60M, among priciest non-waterfront homes ever sold

Renowned interior designer Victoria Hagan and her media mogul husband, Michael Berman, sold a renovated estate in Palm Beach off-market for $60.4 million, marking one of the priciest non-waterfront homes ever sold on the island.

Records show their 130 Banyan LLC, managed by local attorney Maura Ziska, sold the mansion at 130 Banyan Road to the Banyan Road Trust, managed by Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton lawyer Steven M. Loeb. The true buyer is unknown.

Liza Pulitzer and Whitney McGurk of Brown Harris Stevens represented the sellers, they confirmed. Blair Kirwan, also of Brown Harris Stevens, brought the buyer. 

McGurk confirmed Hagan and Berman were the sellers. Hagan helms her eponymous firm, known for projects in the Hamptons, Nantucket and Aspen. Berman is a media mogul, and founded the political magazine George with John F. Kennedy Jr. in 1995. It shuttered in 2001, two years after Kennedy’s death. 

The couple bought the 1-acre Banyan Road property in 2020 for $11.1 million from Phyllis Berman, the widow of financier Martin Berman. Martin Berman founded Fort Lee, New Jersey-based Palisade Capital Management. 

Hagan and her design team at Victoria Hagan Interiors led the gut-renovation of the property. Built in 1926, the nearly 9,700-square-foot mansion has five bedrooms, seven bathrooms, one half-bathroom, a pool and a tennis court, according to property records. 

“Everyone looked at the home as a teardown,” McGurk said of the couple’s 2020 purchase. “Victoria was the only one that really saw the vision of what it could be.”

McGurk and Pulitzer had their clients’ recent pocket listing, but needed a buyer willing to pay a “strong price,” he said. It was a seasonal residence for Hagan and Berman’s family, and they own other properties on the island, he confirmed.

The Banyan Road mansion has some big-name neighbors in Palm Beach’s estate section at the southern end of the island. It shares property lines with billionaire Rhône Group founder Robert Agostinelli at 196 Banyan Road, billionaire Bill Koch’s ex-wife Joan Granlund at 710 South County Road, and author James Patterson at 710 South Ocean Boulevard, property records show. 

The $60.4 million sale marks one of the priciest non-waterfront deals ever on the island. Designer Tom Ford set the record in 2022 when he bought a Jungle Road compound for $51 million, then broke it in 2023 in a home swap valued at over $100 million. 

After a slow start to the season, deals are closing in Palm Beach’s ultra-luxury market. The island’s priciest listing, Tarpon Island, with an asking price of $187.5 million, found a buyer in March. The sale is expected to close in the coming weeks and will likely set a price record for lakefront properties. 

In April, Ideavillage founder Anand Khubani sold an oceanfront acre lot for $85 million. Earlier this month, homebuilder Malasky Homes sold a non-waterfront spec mansion for $43.7 million.