The family of the late George Cohon, the entrepreneur credited with expanding McDonald’s franchises internationally, sold a waterfront lot in Palm Beach for $27.5 million, and their primary estate is also in contract to sell.
Records show the Cohons sold the half-acre lot at Tarpon Way to Could Be 81 LLC, a Florida entity managed by attorney Brian Chesky. Suzanne Frisbie with the Corcoran Group had the listing, and Liza Pulitzer and Whitney McGurk brought the buyer.
George Cohon was the first international franchisee of McDonald’s, primarily in Canada, but is best known as the man who brought the Big Mac to Russia. It took years of negotiations for Cohon to eventually raise the golden arches in Soviet Moscow in 1990, according to published reports. He died in 2023.
He bought the Palm Beach home at 614 Tarpon Way for $3.6 million in 1997, and expanded his estate with the adjacent Tarpon Way lot for $2.6 million in 1998, according to property records. The lot spans half an acre and 255 feet of waterfront, the listing shows.
It hit the market for $29.5 million in October, Redfin shows. The Cohons’ estate at 614 Tarpon Way, which includes an 11,500-square-foot mansion, a one-bedroom guest house, 295 feet of waterfront, a dock and a pool, hit the market for $34.5 million in January and is pending. Frisbie also has that listing.
The deal for the lot could signal growing demand for vacant land in Palm Beach. Last week, a pair of adjacent lots totaling 1 acre and asking a combined $36.1 million went into contract.
Other recent deals this season include Fordham University trustee Kim Bepler’s $30 million purchase of a lakefront home from the family that founded Flagler National Bank, a predecessor of Truist Bank. Also this month, financier Mark Marcello dropped $36 million on an 1.5-acre estate in the Mar-a-Lago Security Zone.
