Feature

When it comes to real estate, Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t just buy a house—he buys the whole block. Or at least a sizable chunk of it. 

Sure, the Meta CEO owns the kind of Silicon Valley compound you’d expect from a tech titan. But as his fortune has grown to the tune of $212 billion, per The Bloomberg Billionaires Index, so has his appetite for land—and lots of it. From a sprawling compound in Hawaii with whispers of a luxury doomsday bunker to a San Francisco pied-à-terre that underwent a multimillion-dollar glow-up before being offloaded for $31 million, Zuckerberg’s portfolio is less about keeping up with the tech-crowd Joneses and more about building his own ultra-private universe. Think of it less as house hunting and more as a masterclass in billionaire nesting.

In classic Zuck fashion, his private domains are huge, heavily upgraded, extensively fortified, and often surrounded by other properties he’s scooped up for the sake of privacy. Some of his holdings are well-known, others are more elusive, like his rumored N.Y.C. apartments and other quietly acquired properties across the U.S. Buckle in as we take a closer look at where Zuckerberg, his wife Priscilla Chan, and their family hang their many hats.

Palo Alto Properties

The Facebook founder’s primary residence in Palo Alto is less of a single home and more of a meticulously assembled mini compound, the result of a series of strategic purchases aimed at preserving privacy and control over his immediate surroundings. 

It all started in March 2011, when Zuckerberg bought a 5,617-square-foot home on Edgewood Drive for $7 million. Just 10 minutes from the social media platform’s Menlo Park HQ, the five-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bath residence came with a saltwater pool, a glass-enclosed sunroom, and a sprawling backyard pavilion. A year later, around the time he and Chan tied the knot, Zuck turned his attention to the homes bordering his Edgewood estate.

Zuckerberg has spent over $43 million assembling his own private compound in Palo Alto.

Google Earth

In 2012, he acquired a neighboring three-bedroom, three-bath home for $4.8 million, and the following year he doubled down—scooping up two additional residences for a combined $10.5 million in September and a four-bedroom abode in October for a cool $14.5 million. 

The grand plan? To demolish four of the homes and create one seamless compound. Concerned about neighborhood character and housing scarcity, the city nixed his demolition proposal in 2016, CNBC reported. Instead, the tech mogul opted for renovations, reportedly leasing the properties back to their original owners in the meantime. All in, he shelled out over $43 million to stitch together his private slice of Palo Alto, now spread over 1.83 acres—a walled garden of tech, tranquility, and very expensive real estate.

Hawaii Holdings 

Zuck’s real estate ambitions don’t stop at Silicon Valley or San Francisco; they stretch all the way to Kauai, where the Meta magnate is building what might be the most secretive (and extravagant) private estate in Hawaii. 

He began his aloha chapter in 2014, when he quietly purchased two lush parcels on Kauai’s North Shore: the 357-acre Kahu’aina Plantation (a former sugarcane farm) for around $66 million and a majority stake in a 393-acre Pila’a Beach spread for roughly $49.8 million. Combined, the two properties total more than 700 acres and set him back about $116 million. That figure has since ballooned. 

Zuckerberg’s holdings in Hawaii span roughly 1,400 acres, with a jaw-dropping price tag of $270 million.

Google Earth

Over the years, Zuck and Chan expanded their island holdings through a series of acquisitions, including 89 more acres in 2017 for $45 million and another 600 acres in 2021 from the conservation-focused Waioli Corporation for $53 million. That brings their total Hawaii holdings to around 1,400 acres, with the price tag adding up to an eye-popping $270 million—$170 million in land and another $100 million in construction costs, according to Wired. 

So, what does one build with nearly $300 million and a mile-long NDA? As it turns out, a lot. Zuckerberg’s Kauai compound, dubbed Koolau Ranch, is said to include two mansions spanning about 57,000 square feet, boasting a whopping 30 bedrooms and 30 bathrooms, plus an industrial kitchen, conference rooms, and multiple elevators—because stairs are for start-ups. The homes are connected by a tunnel leading to a 5,000-square-foot underground shelter, reportedly equipped with an escape hatch, a library, and bomb shelter-style steel-and-concrete doors. Zuckerberg has downplayed the bunker rumors, describing it as “a little shelter,” but the intrigue remains. 

The rest of the estate reads like a luxury summer camp on steroids: guest houses, a tennis court, multiple swimming pools, a gym and sauna, a hot tub and cold plunge, and 11 treehouses connected by rope bridges. And in true off-grid fashion, the compound is said to be fully self-sufficient, with provisions for food and water. The entire property is wrapped in a six-foot-high wall, shielding it from curious passersby and perhaps adding to the legend of what’s quietly becoming one of the most ambitious—and enigmatic—private estates in the world. 

Lake Tahoe Compound 

In classic Zuckerberg fashion, the billionaire rapidly scooped up two neighboring estates totaling about 10 acres on the pristine west shore of the lake —one in December 2018 for $22 million and the other just a few weeks later for $37 million. The deals were done secretly under a veil of nondisclosure agreements and an LLC called Golden Range, according to property records. 

The first of the two, the storied Carousel Estate, sits on 3.5 acres and boasts 200 feet of lake frontage, a private marina-style pier, and enough towering old-growth trees to make it feel like your own national park. At the time he acquired it, the estate included an eight-bedroom main house, a three-bedroom guesthouse, and a caretaker’s apartment. Despite its charm, the nearly century-old residence was deemed not historically significant and has since been torn down to make way for something far more grand, SFGate has reported.

The Meta CEO spent around $59 million on two adjoining lakefront estates in Lake Tahoe.

Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Next door, the Brushwood Estate brought another six acres to the party, with 400 feet of shoreline and a private pier. This was no sleepy Tahoe lodge—it once hosted glitzy soirées like an Oscar de la Renta fashion show and the Lake Tahoe Summer Music Festival. 

Both properties are being transformed into what planning documents describe as a seven-building compound designed to blend rustic elegance with cutting-edge luxury. At the heart of it all is a 20,000-square-foot, 35-foot-tall main residence, shaped like an L, clad in timber and glass, and crowned with a shingled roof.

All in the compound will have over 75,000 square feet of developed space that will include a gatehouse, a gym, a couple of guesthouses and a bunkhouse, a lakeside spa, and a home office.

Across the property are stone walkways, bridges, and nature trails that weave through the landscape, offering serene strolls with postcard-ready views of Lake Tahoe’s crystal-clear waters and snow-capped peaks. Zuckerberg’s Tahoe hideaway may not be as vast or headline-grabbing as his deluxe bunker in Hawaii, but it’s just as ambitious.

D.C. Mansion 

Zuckerberg’s newest real estate addition isn’t on the California coast, a Hawaiian island, or one of the country’s most expensive lakes—it’s in the heart of the nation’s capital, where hordes of billionaires have been flocking since the 2024 election. In March 2025, the social media mogul plunked down $23 million in cash for a striking 15,400-square-foot mansion in the exclusive Massachusetts Avenue Heights neighborhood—making it one of the top three most expensive residential sales in the district’s history.  

Designed by renowned architect Robert Gurney, the residence has been hailed for marrying classic East Coast elegance with a clean, modern sensibility. Think brick façade, gabled roofs, tall chimneys, and steel-framed windows—a nod to traditional D.C. style—but inside, the vibe is all sleek lines, natural light, and architectural precision. 

In March 2025, Zuckerberg shelled out $23 million in cash for his new home in Washington, D.C.

Anice Hoachlander

Interestingly, it was originally built for a couple known for hosting major events and fundraisers, so the layout is equal parts family-friendly retreat and diplomatic party central. For Zuckerberg, it’s another strategic foothold—equal parts personal sanctuary and political base camp. 

True to form, the purchase was wrapped in secrecy but eventually confirmed by Meta, which said the home would allow Zuckerberg to “spend more time [in D.C.] as Meta continues the work on policy issues related to American technology leadership.” And, if his real estate past is an indicator of the future, Zuckerberg may have his eye on some of the surrounding homes, too.

Authors

Abby Montanez

Abigail Montanez is a staff writer at Robb Report. She has worked in both print and digital publishing for over half a decade, covering everything from real estate, entertainment, dining, travel to…

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