Late MLB Owner Peter Magowan’s Napa Valley Home Lists for $13 Million

A lifelong baseball fan who grew up in New York, Peter Magowan missed his very first day of school to attend Game One of the 1951 World Series between the Giants and Yankees with his father. Years later, he was heartbroken when his beloved Giants announced a relocation to San Francisco. Fate intervened, however, and he and his family moved to the City by the Bay soon after.

Fast forward to 1992, and Magowan was once again faced with the possibility of losing his favorite team, this time to Tampa Bay. A successful chairman and CEO of Safeway and a Giants board member by that time, he swung into action and gathered a group of investors to purchase the Giants at the last minute, saving the team from going to Florida.

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One of his first orders of business during his 16-season tenure as general managing partner was signing All-Star outfielder Barry Bonds to a record $43.75 million contract. He went on to spearhead the building of a privately financed, 41,000-seat PacBell Park on the downtown waterfront, today called Oracle Park, and was inducted into the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame in 2016 for his achievements, which included four World Series berths and three championships. He died in 2019 at age 76.

During the 1990s, Magowan and his wife, Debby, who maintained a primary residence in San Francisco’s affluent Pacific Heights neighborhood, shelled out around $1.2 million for a roughly five-acre Napa Valley getaway with a main home, pool, and garage topped by a guest apartment. Through the years, the couple tacked on about 15 more acres, which included vineyards with sauvignon blanc, cabernet, and petit verdot grape varietals used for winemaking. They also built a new pool, pool house, tennis court, and garage and expanded the guesthouse, per The Wall Street Journal.

Now, with 80-year-old Debby spending most of her time these days in Florida, the couple’s picturesque retreat has hit the market at $13 million, with Ginger Martin of Sotheby’s International Realty, St. Helena Brokerage handling the listing. The completed spread offers a total of seven bedrooms, half a dozen bathrooms, and two powder rooms across 7,175 square feet, with the two-story primary dwelling donning wide-plank hardwood floors, cream-hued Venetian plaster walls, and soaring wood-beam ceilings paired with smart-home and solar systems.

A wood-burning fireplace anchors the living room, with French doors spilling out to a spacious courtyard ideal for lounging and entertaining. Elsewhere is a formal dining room, a family room, and a farmhouse-style kitchen sporting high-end appliances, a butler’s pantry, and an adjoining breakfast nook with a built-in banquette. Other highlights include a handsome wood-paneled study lined with bookshelves, along with a plush primary suite sporting a fireplace and a bath showcased by a marble-clad soaking tub.

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The sprawling mountain-view grounds, laced with an abundance of colorful roses, host an alfresco dining space, a kitchen pavilion, a pool and spa, and a tennis court bordered by a pergola-shaded viewing area. Rounding it all off are the ancillary structures—a pool house with a kitchen and living room and a separate 1,000-square-foot guesthouse with a game room and two en suite bedrooms, plus a detached two-car garage.

The son of a Safeway chief executive, Magowan rose through the supermarket chain’s ranks from checker, shelf stocker, and produce clerk to chairman and CEO. He was also the grandson of Charles Merrill, cofounder of the investment bank and brokerage firm Merrill Lynch.

Click here for more photos of the Napa Valley residence.