Brazil Soccer Star Ronaldo Buys $8 Million Penthouse in Miami
(Bloomberg) — Brazilian legend Ronaldo has purchased a $7.8 million penthouse on Miami’s Bay Harbor Islands, joining a growing list of football players who own trophy properties in the area, records show.
Ronaldo’s purchase follows his sale of controlling shares in Spanish club Real Valladolid last year and Brazilian club Cruzeiro, where he started his career. World Cup champion Ronaldo Luis Nazario de Lima is best known among football fans as Ronaldo, or o fenômeno in Brazil.
“Sports and athletes go hand in hand in Miami,” said Dina Goldentayer, who represents the sellers, a team of developers completing the 41-unit apartment building Onda Residences in 2024. Goldentayer highlighted events ranging from Formula 1 to the city’s upcoming World Cup matches.
Ronaldo was in the crowd at last weekend’s Miami Open women’s tennis final and attended the FII Priority conference with FIFA President Gianni Infantino in Miami Beach last week.
The seaside penthouse has five bedrooms, seven bathrooms and a large roof terrace with a private pool.
Goldentayer declined to comment on the identity of the buyer. Public records at the penthouse, located on a man-made island in the northern part of Biscayne Bay, show an LLC owner that can be traced back to Ronaldo. Broker Talita Pinheiro, who represented the buyer, declined to comment. Ronaldo’s representatives did not respond to a request for comment.
Miami has emerged as a football capital in the United States. FIFA and FC Barcelona have opened offices in the region, and Miami will host seven World Cup matches this summer. The city’s Major League Soccer team, Inter Miami, has attracted Lionel Messi, widely regarded as the best player in the world; this was a symbolic achievement of the growing popularity of the US league and the growing popularity of Miami as a football centre.
Inter Miami brought other big names to South Florida; Messi’s FC Barcelona teammates Sergio Busquets and Luis Suarez also signed contracts with the team and followed this with major real estate purchases. Ronaldo’s former Real Madrid teammate David Beckham is part owner of Inter Miami. Beckham bought a $72 million mansion in Miami Beach in 2024.
This isn’t Ronaldo’s first involvement with South Florida. In 2014, he became a minority owner of the Fort Lauderdale Strikers, a team in the now-extinct North American Soccer League.
Miami’s real estate market has reached new heights since the pandemic, when a wave of assets from the Northeast and Midwest have relocated. The top end of the market has soared this year with an influx of high-profile billionaire buyers from California who are suspected of dodging the proposed billionaires tax.
“Athletes love it as much as CEOs, financiers and tech guys in California,” real estate broker Goldentayer said. Alphabet Inc. Silicon Valley bigwigs like co-founders Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Meta Platforms Inc.’s Mark Zuckerberg have all purchased property in Miami in recent months, and Zuckerberg’s purchase broke a Miami-Dade County record.
“Buyers like this create confidence in the market,” he said. “These buyers can live anywhere in the world, and they choose Miami.”
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