LAGUNA BEACH — David Wilson remembers his favorite moment at his oceanfront estate: lying in bed with his wife in their master bedroom, gazing at the night sky.
The circular bed rotated beneath an open retractable ceiling, while the Pacific Ocean surrounded their “sanctuary.”
“We lay in bed and watched the meteor showers,” Wilson told the Business Journal. “It was an unbelievable experience. You’re surrounded on three sides by water — it’s like being on a boat.”
After owning the home for more than 25 years, Wilson, the founder and chief executive of Wilson Automotive Group, has listed the eight bedroom, 13.5-bath, 14,400-square-foot home on an acre of beachfront land for sale at $112 million.
It’s the latest sign that Wilson is reducing his presence in Orange County. In 2020 during the pandemic, Wilson and his wife moved to Henderson, Nevada, and later made it their permanent home. Their daughter settled in Arizona after law school, and their son joined the family business and prefers to live in West Hollywood. The couple also spends summers at their lake house in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, so they have little time to use the Laguna Beach estate.
“It is bittersweet,” Wilson said. “When it sells, I’m not really going to be that happy about it, but we don’t have a use for it anymore.”
While Wilson is reducing his local presence, his Orange-based company continues to be active. The most recent additions include Gardena Honda, which Wilson acquired in 2024, and another in Tepic, Mexico that finished construction last year. In 2024, Wilson sold Tustin Lexus and Newport Lexus to Group 1 Automotive in 2024 for an estimated $300 million.
Wilson Automotive, which owns 18 dealerships in three states and Mexico, is on track for a record $4.2 billion in sales this year. It ranked eighth on the Business Journal’s June list of the biggest privately owned companies with headquarters in Orange County.
He has promoted several salespeople to general managers and junior partners and now employs second- and third-generation family members.
“Buying more dealerships doesn’t really improve my lifestyle, it just gives more opportunity for our associates,” Wilson told the Business Journal earlier this year. “I can’t take care of all those customers that we have. But if I take care of the employees, they’ll take care of the customer.”
Orange County’s New Luxury Benchmark
The offering comes just weeks after a 10,000-square-foot custom oceanfront estate in Laguna Beach’s Emerald Bay community sold for $110 million, the highest known residential sale in Orange County history.
Such a sale shows that Orange County’s ultra-luxury housing market has reached a new “benchmark,” said listing agents Meital Taub and Jill Lockhart of Laguna Beach-based Livel Real Estate, who represents Wilson.
The agents told the Business Journal that Orange County’s trophy estates are now competing with top properties in Malibu, Palm Beach and Aspen for the world’s wealthiest buyers.
They said the recent Emerald Bay sale proves Orange County can reach nine-figure prices for truly unique estates, though not every luxury home fits that category.
“It demonstrated that ultra-high-net-worth buyers are willing to pay nine figures for irreplaceable properties,” Taub told the Business Journal.
$20M to Renovate Property
Architect Fred Briggs, known for his work at the Laguna College of Art and Design, designed the estate in the 1970s for financier Boyd Jefferies, who founded what is now Jefferies Financial Group.
Later, WordPerfect co-founder Bruce Bastian owned the home before Wilson bought the property.
Property records show that Wilson purchased it in 2001 for about $17.9 million after it sat on the market for years. It originally listed for $21 million in 1998, according to Redfin.
Before moving in, Wilson said he spent over $20 million to renovate and expand the home. He replaced almost every major electrical, plumbing, and mechanical system and added two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a movie theater, office, guest house, gym and laundry room.
Wilson and his agents believe the home’s greatest value is that it can’t be recreated.
Large portions of the home were built before the California Coastal Commission adopted many of its current setback requirements.
Wilson said parts of the great room, library and primary suite extend over the Pacific Ocean, while the expansive oceanfront deck and swimming pool occupy locations where similar construction likely would not be permitted today.
“You can’t build anything like that in California anymore,” Wilson said.
The property is on Rockledge Road, between Victoria Beach and Moss Point.
It includes over an acre of oceanfront land with direct beach access, an eight-car garage, private tennis court, wellness center, theater, wine cellar, and more than 2,000 square feet of oceanfront terraces.
“It’s just a unique unicorn property,” Wilson said.
Lockhart said that pricing a property like this depends more on its rarity than on comparable sales.
“The price reflects what can’t be built today,” she said, “not what it would have cost to build yesterday.”
The agents said that after listing the property, it quickly attracted qualified buyers and several private showings during its first weekend.
‘Why Sell?’
For Wilson, selling the home is not about breaking records.
He said the property was briefly listed for $106 million in 2022 but was never officially on the market. Instead, it was leased to a tenant who used it as a beach house while renovating a home in Beverly Hills.
“His home was completed. He didn’t renew his lease,” Wilson said. “So, we decided to sell it because we’re not using it anymore.”
Wilson thinks the estate’s next owner will probably keep it for many years.
“It’s only changed hands a few times in 50 years,” he said. “It’s not likely to change hands again for a long time.”