A jaw-dropping real estate sale has just made history in Florida. A 15-acre waterfront compound in Naples has sold for $225 million, setting a new state record and becoming the second most expensive home ever sold in the United States.
The sprawling 15-acre estate was quietly assembled by the DeGroote family of Canada beginning in the 1990s. The late Michael DeGroote, a trucking and waste management magnate who later became a noted philanthropist, was responsible for acquiring the properties that now make up the compound. Property records show the DeGrootes consolidated multiple adjacent parcels over the years to create one of the largest private beachfront holdings in the country.
The estate was originally listed for $295 million in October 2024. After sitting on the market for several months without a buyer, it ultimately changed hands at a discounted price of $225 million — still enough to shatter Florida’s previous residential record of $173 million, set in 2022 when Oracle founder Larry Ellison purchased an estate in Manalapan.
A One-of-a-Kind Property
The DeGroote compound consists of three separate residences, featuring a total of 11 bedrooms and 20 bathrooms across approximately 8,800 square feet of living space. The estate includes 800 feet of private beach frontage along the Gulf of Mexico, tennis courts, a pool, landscaped ponds, and sprawling lawns.
Despite the grandeur of the property, the listing notably included no interior photos, suggesting that the homes were being marketed as potential teardowns, with the true value lying in the land itself. The lack of detailed interior descriptions further fueled speculation that the anonymous buyer plans to build a custom megamansion on the site.
Adding a layer of complexity to the sale: the estate sits in a FEMA-classified Special Flood Hazard Area and carries an “extreme” flood risk rating of 9 out of 10 according to Realtor.com’s climate risk assessments. Over the next 30 years, the property has a 99.9% chance of experiencing flooding due to a combination of sea-level rise, precipitation, and hurricane storm surges.
As news of the sale spreads, photos and videos of the property are already vanishing from the internet. But one of the realtors still has some good shots on Instagram:
A Fortune Built Off School Buses
The wealth behind the Naples estate stems from Michael DeGroote, a self-made Canadian billionaire who built an empire in transportation and waste management. Born in Belgium in 1933 and immigrating to Canada at age 14, DeGroote left school in the ninth grade to help support his family.
At just 18, he launched his first business hauling manure with a used army truck. In 1959, he acquired Laidlaw Transport Ltd., a small trucking company based in Ontario. Under DeGroote’s leadership, Laidlaw rapidly expanded into school bus services and waste management, eventually becoming the largest school bus operator and third-largest waste management company in North America. That’s right. Those iconic yellow ‘Laidlaw’ school buses? There’s a good chance you rode one growing up — or at least got stuck behind one on your morning commute.
In 1988, DeGroote sold his stake in Laidlaw to Canadian Pacific for approximately $499 million and later retired to Bermuda. In addition to his business success, he was a major philanthropist, donating generously to institutions like McMaster University, whose business and medical schools are named in his honor.
Michael DeGroote passed away in 2022 at the age of 89. His entrepreneurial success and charitable legacy funded the family’s ability to piece together this extraordinary compound over several decades, culminating in one of the most expensive home sales in U.S. history.
Buyer Remains Anonymous
The identity of the buyer has not been disclosed. Kevin Coleman, an attorney representing the buyer, confirmed the sale price but declined to comment further or reveal the buyer’s name. The deal continues a trend of high-net-worth individuals using trusts, LLCs, or legal representatives to shield their identities in major transactions.
One of the Most Expensive Sales in American History
With a final sale price of $225 million, the Naples compound now ranks as the second-most expensive home ever sold in the United States, trailing only Ken Griffin’s $238 million penthouse purchase at 220 Central Park South in New York City in 2019.
Here’s how the top of the all-time leaderboard now looks:
| Rank | Price | Property | Buyer |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $238M | 220 Central Park South, NYC | Ken Griffin |
| 2 | $225M | 15-Acre Beachfront Compound, Naples, FL | Anonymous |
| 3 | $210M | 9.5-Acre Malibu Estate | Delaware LLC |
| 4 | $200M | 8-Acre Malibu Estate (Jay-Z and Beyoncé) | Jay-Z and Beyoncé |
