We continue our look back at the top sales of 2024 with a tour of the Hill Section's highest-dollar transactions.
The year saw the second- and third-highest sales ever on the public market for the area.
2024 also ended with your blog author, Dave, and Edge as the #1 ranked agent/team for the Hill Section. No agent or team sold more properties for more money than we did last year in the Hill Section. (If this isn't news to you, our advertising is working!)
For other top-sales posts, see the top Strand sales of 2024, other top Sand Section sales of 2024 and Tree Section New Construction & Lots.
Resales Division
1012 Pacific (6br/8ba, 9272 sqft.) is an extra-special, highly inspired, spare-no-expense home on a nearly 12,000 sqft. lot.
It's 15 years old and close to downtown Manhattan Beach, but it could be 100 years old and sitting in the Hamptons or Nantucket, showing like it's upgraded to magazine-quality modern perfection.
The number of living spaces and the volume of those spaces is really extra extra, with both a huge formal living room and giant family/great room on the main level, and then a tiered home theater downstairs plus a mega rec room.
There's outdoor living as well, with a custom pool and guest house.
It was a "must have." Though it sold for $1.100M under asking ($16.000M), it was still the top sale of 2024.
1012 Pacific sold for $14.900M in June 2024, making it the 2nd-highest public-market sale ever in the Hill Section. (See this post for more.)
808 John St. (5br/6ba, 6604 sqft., lot: 20,168 sqft.) is a remarkable double-lot property with ocean views and superb walkability to town.
Come on, now, it's John Street!
This top sale of the year in the Hill Section reflects our Edge office's work. And not just "paper pushing," but rather, opportunity spotting.
Everyone interested in the the Hill Section knew 808 John was available. At the time our clients offered, it was in its 11th month on market.
Availability wasn't the issue. Price was. The property began in Sept. 2023 at $19.900M, and cut to $16.900M in March '24, where it lingered through the Summer.
Our clients were looking for more outdoor space, and hoped to score it in the Hill Section. Meantime, we had one active listing in the Hill Section, we were monitoring the market closely, and we were doing some analyses for others.
We took a long, hard look at 808 John, and reasoned: Someone is going to get this for about $14M. To our clients, we said: Why not you?
As we got the property under contract, the deal it represented became even more evident. Two very nearby lot sales each closed for $10.000M – each half the size of 808 John St., and with homes on site that will eventually be razed and replaced. (The lot sales are 700 John and 821 8th, noted down below in the Lot Sales section of this post.)
Meantime, the huge house at 808 John lent itself to an update with some stylistic remodeling, which it's now getting.
Not only was 808 John among the top sales of 2024 in the Hill Section, it was the deal of the year – it may be hard for any other sale to match this one's bang for the buck for a while.
808 John St. sold for $14.100M in September 2024, marking it as the 3rd-highest public-market sale ever in the Hill Section.
819 11th Street (6br/7ba, 4997 sqft., lot: 8700 sqft.) is slightly out of order here, as there are pricier properties below.
But we're invoking blogger's privilege here to tout our own listing/sale in tandem with our successful buyer representation noted above, at 808 John St.
We first met with the sellers of 819 11th more than a year before the sale.
The 1998 build looked very much its age, and with 20 years of "stuff" throughout, it was going to be a project to get the house ready.
But we mapped out a plan, including priorities for a remodel and refresh, and got the home to market, delivering $500K more than a similar neighboring home and nearly $1M more than the sale of an extremely similar house on a smaller lot nearby.
819 11th Street was sold for $5.950M in December 2024.
401 N Dianthus Street (6br/7ba, 6312 sqft.) is a brilliant 2019 build that showed like a model home.
A chunk of its square footage is in a basement area, with a huge living space, home theater and a spare bedroom.
401 N Dianthus Street was sold for $8.995M in October 2024.
114 N Poinsettia Avenue (5br/6ba, 6013 sqft.) is a corner-lot custom Spanish, with a bit of a choppy floorplan, which was marketed for parts of 2022-24, at prices as high as $9.600M.
114 N Poinsettia Avenue was sold for $8.000M in May 2024.
1019 Duncan Avenue (5br/6ba, 4586 sqft.) s an ocean-view Spanish built in '08, with some style upgrades, particularly to the kitchen. The design makes nice use of the front and side patios to maximize views and outdoor living.
The lot is on the small side for the Hill Section, at 4998 sqft.
1019 Duncan Avenue was sold for $6.000M in October 2024.
Lot Sales Division
700 John (6br/5ba, 4770 sqft.) is a land sale, although there is a 6br, 4770 sqft. house on site now.
The lot was first purchased in June 2021 at $8.700M.
In September 2024, it closed for $10.000M, in an off-market sale that followed two listings that consumed most of 2023 (asking $10.475M and then $9.999M).
For much of its public-market run in 2023, 700 John was offered along with architectural plans for a mega house (7200 sqft.), although some buyers found that particular design a bit spendy for what could be a 3-year build.
Then again, when you start at $10M for dirt, what's holding you back?
821 8th Street (3br/2ba, 2325 sqft.) is just steps away from 808 John (2nd sale noted way above) and 700 John (lot sale noted directly above).
This 10,080 sqft. lot along an alley could be compared to either half of 808 John, but it sold for a lot more than half of what 808 John sold for.
821 8th sold off-market for $10.000M in late July in an off-market sale, purely land value, with the special factor of a neighbor buying it – perhaps in part for view protection.
931 1st Street (2br/1ba, 948 sqft., lot: 9595 sqft.) offers a big, wide view lot in the southern part of the Hill Section.
The area has huge upside now, as neighbors rallied to get rid of the vast, unsightly tangle of telephone poles and wires. (Most prime view areas of the Hill Section ousted their poles many years ago, but the southern area took a pass till recently.)
We took note of the property in a rundown of the oldest houses on market in early 2023, noting the little house's build date of 1920, even if everyone knew the cottage had a date with a 'dozer.
931 1st Street was sold for $5.900M in May 2024.
