Two Sagaponack parcels, including an oceanfront property, asking for a total of $48 million, made it to contract last week before it was even officially on the market.
Christopher Covert of Compass is representing the sellers in the transaction, along with Chris Coleman, also of Compass. Hedgerow Exclusive Properties, a Bridgehampton-based firm that specializes in off-market transactions, brought the buyer. Covert declined to say how much the buyer has agreed to pay for two separate and single parcels totaling almost four acres. Hedgerow also declined to comment.
The two oceanfront acres at 35 Potato Road and the vacant property to the north at 543 Daniel’s Lane, were billed as “a once in a generation opportunity to create a legacy estate compound by the sea.”
The oceanfront property is also rare in that it is situated above the flood zone. The property is elevated just enough that a lower level could easily be designed if building new without the constraints many other oceanfront properties have.
The current 5,200-square-foot home on the first lot enjoys 250 feet of direct ocean frontage with views from every level. Originally, there were two one-acre parcels on the ocean with two separate homes, Covert explained. When one family sold it to the neighboring one, the properties were merged and the two homes were connected with an enclosed breezeway.
“It is certainly a very well maintained home as it is,” Covert said. There are a total of seven bedrooms and five-and-a-half baths, along with a third-level sunroom, roof deck and multiple oceanside decks.
In addition, there is an oceanside gunite pool and an indoor Endless lap pool for year-round swimming.
To the north is the undeveloped, but cleared, nearly two-acre lot at 543 Daniel’s Lane — one of the last undeveloped parcels of land this close to the beach in all the Hamptons. There is room for a house with 7,000 square feet of space above grade plus a lower level. A pool, pool house and tennis court could also be built.
Covert refused to name the sellers or the buyers.
According to property records, 35 Potato Road and 543 Daniel’s Lane are owned by a limited liability corporation called Chicken Coop since 2019. The late philanthropist Diane (Didi) W. Burke transferred ownership into the LLC.
Burke’s late husband James (Jim) E. Burke, who had served as chairman and CEO during the course of his 37 years with Johnson & Johnson, was listed on the deed for 35 Potato Road as of 2016, though he died in 2012. Burke’s sister, Phyllis Davis, is also listed on the Daniel’s Lane property (Many will recognize the Bridgehampton homeowner’s name as a benefactress of local charities and Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, where the Edmund & Phyllis Davis Wellness Institute exists).
Fortune magazine named Jim Burke one of history’s greatest 10 CEOs in 2003, much in part due to his leadership during the Tylenol poisonings in 1982 and, according to The Washington Post, Burke took charge of a committee to produce tamper-proof packaging. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the country in 2000.
His wife, whose father served as Assistant Secretary of the Interior under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, died in December at the age of 94.
The couple was passionate about improving the health and well-being of children and created a philanthropic foundation. For more than 25 years, the Burke Foundation has supported programming in fields including the arts, health care, education, and community revitalization, with an emphasis on creating equal opportunities for all families and children, according to its website.
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