A Modern Home in Silicon Valley Lists for $44 Million
A five-bedroom Palo Alto home designed by Steven Ehrlich is listed for $44 million, making it the city’s most expensive listing. Built around a dramatic concrete spine, the home features four courtyards and a pool.
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For years, tech entrepreneur Asher Waldfogel and his wife, Helyn MacLean, dreamed of building a modern house in Palo Alto, Calif.
The couple, however, worried about clashing with the Mediterranean-style architecture typically associated with their neighborhood of Old Palo Alto.
So they tapped architect Steven Ehrlich to create a design that paid homage to its surroundings with stucco, mahogany and titanium zinc cladding. They spent $20 million over several years building the house, completed in 2005.
Now looking to be closer to their adult daughter on the East Coast, they are putting the five-bedroom home on the market for $44 million—the most expensive listing in Palo Alto.
Waldfogel is an angel investor who co-founded Redback Networks, a telecommunications-equipment company. MacLean previously had a career in fundraising.
The couple purchased the roughly 0.4-acre site for $7.1 million in 2000 and demolished a circa-1930s Spanish Colonial home. The house they built pinwheels around a central staircase. It has 7,900 square feet of livable space, with four distinct courtyards and a pool.
A key feature of the home is a cast-in-place concrete wall, or spine, that is two stories high and about 80 feet long. “There’s a little bit of controlled chaos in what comes out of the form,” unlike a perfectly uniform surface, Waldfogel said. “If you want that, you do it in plastic.”
Waldfogel said he and his wife are thinking about the next phase of life now that their daughter is grown, although they have not decided where they will move. They also have a home in Sun Valley, Idaho.
“Right now we’re just trying to emotionally let go and decide what to do next,” he said.
Palo Alto, an epicenter of venture capital and tech startups in Silicon Valley, is home to some of the country’s biggest tech titans. Sales volume and prices are rising, with a median sale price of $3.5 million for the three months ending in August, up 5.8% year-over-year, according to real-estate brokerage Redfin.
Arthur Sharif of Sotheby’s International Realty—San Francisco Brokerage has the listing.
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2 minBorrowers cannot control the Reserve Bank, but they can control how exposed their household budget is to its next decision.
The RBA meets on 29 September with inflation concerns still elevated and major-bank economists increasingly bringing forward their rate-rise calls. Fixed mortgage rates have also been moving, reducing the value of waiting for perfect certainty.
The first task is to calculate the impact of another 0.25 percentage-point increase. Indicative Canstar figures reported earlier this month suggest that such a move would add about $91 a month to repayments on a $600,000 loan, $122 on $800,000 and $152 on $1 million, although actual changes depend on rate, term and loan structure.
The second task is to compare the current loan with the market. Borrowers should examine the interest rate, annual package fee, offset balance, redraw rules and the revert rate on any expiring fixed portion. A lower advertised rate is not necessarily a better deal after fees, lost features or refinancing costs.
Third, test the household budget at least one percentage point above the current rate. This is not a forecast; it is a resilience exercise. Include council rates, strata, insurance, maintenance, school costs and realistic discretionary spending. Investors should also allow for vacancy and repairs rather than assuming uninterrupted rent.
Fourth, contact the existing lender before lodging multiple applications. A borrower with a sound repayment history may be able to negotiate a discount without refinancing. If the offer is weak, obtain comparable quotes and seek advice on whether changing lenders will genuinely improve the position.
Fifth, preserve liquidity. Using every available dollar to reduce principal may feel prudent, but an offset account can provide interest savings while retaining access to cash. The right structure depends on tax position and loan purpose, particularly where owner-occupied and investment debt coexist.
Borrowers considering a fixed rate face a trade-off. Fixing can provide repayment certainty, but may restrict additional repayments, offsets or early exit. Splitting a loan can diversify rate exposure without removing risk.
The worst time to examine a mortgage is after repayments have become unmanageable. A review conducted now gives borrowers more choices: renegotiate, refinance, adjust spending or build a buffer while their record remains strong.
Borrower checklist
Calculate: Repayments after a 0.25 and one percentage-point increase.
Compare: Rate, fees, offset, redraw, cashback conditions and total cost.
Review: Fixed-rate expiry, interest-only expiry and remaining loan term.
Protect: Emergency liquidity and insurance.
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