James E. Dixon, who built a New York City-based talent agency with clients including Jimmy Kimmel, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, is the new co-owner of a 1950s-era house on the North End of Palm Beach.
Dixon and his wife, Tanja, paid a recorded $8.9 million for the house at 256 Mockingbird Trail. Measuring about a half-acre, the property was being marketed with town-approved architectural plans for a new residence, the sales listing said.
The Dixons are still finalizing their plans for the property, said agent Gary Pohrer, who acted on their behalf in the sale with his Douglas Elliman Real Estate colleague Chris Leavitt. The buyers might tweak the already-approved plans or start fresh, Pohrer said.
James Dixon founded and was president and CEO of Dixon Talent Inc. when he sold the boutique agency in 2015 to WME-IMG, with the understanding it would continue to operate independently under the same name, according to published reports at the time of the sale.
Built in 1951, the three-bedroom house the Dixons bought stands midway between the Palm Beach Country Club and the northern tip of the island. With 4,292 square feet of living space, inside and out, the house is the second one east of North Lake Way on the south side of Mockingbird Trail.
The seller was M2B Properties LLC, a Georgia-based limited liability company controlled by Mary Frances Garrett, who has bought and sold other properties in Palm Beach beginning in 2020.
M2B Properties paid a recorded $3.195 million for the property on Mockingbird Trail in August 2020, just as the real estate boom sparked by the coronavirus pandemic got underway in Palm Beach.
The architectural plans already approved for the lot call for a house with six-bedrooms and 5,683 total square feet, according to the sales description prepared by listing agent Elizabeth DeWoody of Compass Florida. The proposed house was designed architect Gregory L. Palmer of Harrison Design, who has drawn up plans for other projects spearheaded by M2B Properties.
DeWoody’s listing said the buyer could “enjoy the existing home, renovate, lease or build new.” It mentioned the lot’s location “on the sunny south side of the street,” its proximity to the Lake Trail walking-and-biking path and its access to a private beach cabana for use by neighborhood residents.
DeWoody listed the house in November at $11.9 million and within a month had dropped the price by $1 million, the multiple listing service shows. The property underwent another price cut in February to $9.9 million.
DeWoody and Garrett declined to comment about the sale.
The deed recorded June 26 lists the Dixons with a mailing address in Manhasset, New York. They also have owned a vacation home in the Bear’s Club golf-course community in Jupiter since 2014, property records show. Leavitt and Pohrer have co-listed the Jupiter house — a seven-bedroom waterfront home at 131 Bear’s Club Drive — at $18.5 million, the MLS shows.
Leavitt declined to comment.
DeWoody and agent Bill Yahn of the Corcoran Group acted on behalf of M2B Properties when it bought the house on Mockingbird Trail in 2020. At that time, the property was co-listed by agents Dana Koch and Paulette Koch of Corcoran for seller Curtis D. Emmer.
Among Garrett’s Palm Beach real estate deals, the largest closed in March 2022. In that sale, DeWoody represented M2B Properties when it paid a recorded $23.53 million for two adjacent North End houses at 1285 N. Ocean Blvd. and 1287 N. Ocean Way. Those two houses had been listed by agent Lilly Leas Ferreira of Brown Harris Stevens.
In May 2023, M2B Properties sold — for a recorded $11.5 million — a property the company had purchased for $6.5 million in 2021 in a private transaction at 225 Wells Road. After buying the house, Garrett razed it and won the town’s approval for a new home there designed by Palmer. DeWoody acted for the seller in the deal last year on Wells Road, with Leavitt and his Elliman colleague Ashley McIntosh on the buyer’s side. The sale include the house plans.
M2B Property’s first residential purchase in Palm Beach closed in June 2020, when the company paid a recorded $3.667 million for property in Midtown at 165 Seapray Ave. and made plans to build a house on speculation there. Shortly after breaking ground, the company sold the Seaspray property with the house plans for a recorded $9 million in April 2021. In the 2021 transaction, DeWoody represented the seller, while agents Jack Elkins and Bunny Hiatt of William Raveis South Florida acted for the buyers. After the sale, Garrett shepherded the construction of the house to completion for the new owners.
In the 2020 transaction on Seaspray, DeWoody represented M2B Properties, negotiating opposite agents Todd and Frances Peter of Sotheby’s International Realty.
Darrell Hofheinz is a USA TODAY Network of Florida journalist who writes about Palm Beach real estate in his weekly “Beyond the Hedges” column. He welcomes tips about real estate news on the island. Email dhofheinz@pbdailynews.com, call 561-820-3831 or tweet @PBDN_Hofheinz.
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