The most expensive zip code in the U.S. racks up another sale over $40M

Atherton won’t likely be losing its title as the country’s most expensive zip code anytime soon.

For the second time this year, an off-market deal has brought an over-$40-million sale to the small Peninsula town that tech founders, CEOs and even Warriors star Steph Curry call home.

Public records show that 98 Sutherland, located on two acres at the end of a cul de sac west of the Alameda, changed hands for $41.1 million last month—a more than $4 million increase in less than two years. The six-bedroom, 6.5-bath home of more than 10,000 square feet last sold in the summer of 2020, when it was purchased by Timeless Vista LLC for $36,750,000.

The undisclosed owners behind Timeless Vista seem to have already put their gains to use with the purchase of 338 Walsh Road, less than a mile from the Sutherland property. The $26-million sale closed about a week after that of their previous home, according to public records. The home on Walsh is newly built and was listed with slightly more square footage than Sutherland, but sits on about half the acreage and is closer to the road.

Privacy appears to be a key amenity for the new owners on Sutherland, who are hidden behind an LLC and chose a home that is hidden from the street as well. In fact, little is known about the off-market property other than its size. The last time the home was listed publicly was 2014, when it sold for $13.5 million. But given the over-$20-million difference when it resold in 2020–– the 1930s-era home described at that time as remodeled in the 1990s but retaining “all of the charm of a gracious Southern mansion”––the property has almost certainly undergone a major renovation in the interim.

The Sutherland deal trails the $44.8-million sale of 119 Tuscaloosa Avenue, closer to downtown Menlo Park, in February on Atherton’s priciest list this year. The sale of the Tuscaloosa property was the most expensive Atherton sale in three years, and another example of a mansion that went in the mid-$30-million range just a few years ago and is now able to command over $40 million.

Even with rising prices in the area, no Atherton property has yet been able to break the $53-million record sale of a 12-acre estate in 2011. Gap founders Don and Doris Fischer are hoping to set a new standard with the sale of their long-held 8-acre estate, listed last fall for $100 million. It is currently the most expensive property on the market in the Bay Area, after a Woodside listing across the street from Larry Ellison’s home dropped its asking from $110 million to $84 million in March.