High-flying Wall Street banker Ken Moelis is apparently a big fan of social distancing, having just dropped a tremendous sum of money to acquire his next-door neighbor’s home in Malibu. The off-market, $21.5 million transaction closed this month, and the Moelis family holdings now include two side-by-side homes with 8,600 square feet of living space and 8 bedrooms and 10 bathrooms, all of them located on one of the seaside city’s most coveted strips of sand.

Tax records say the latest acquisition was built in 1986 and last sold in 2017 to Calabasas-based real estate investor Gary Simons. Since then, the house has been occasionally used as a high-priced rental; the MLS shows it was leased out in 2018 at a brain-addling rate of $42,000 per month.

The vaguely Mediterranean villa-style house spans sits on a long and narrow beachfront lot. Street-side, there’s a two car garage and gated entrance to a courtyard; further back is the main house with its beachside deck and stunning whitewater views. Upstairs, there’s a large master with a fireplace and private balcony.

Included with the transfer were renderings for a full-scale contemporary home renovation, though it’s not clear if Moelis plans to proceed with the work. The renderings show a newly reimagined getaway with foldaway glass doors blurring the indoor/outdoor barrier, a new courtyard swimming pool, a European-inspired kitchen, and a completely open floorplan with dozens of twinkling recessed LED lights.

Other deep-pocketed homeowners along this same dazzling strip of Malibu sand include brotherly billionaires Alec and Tom Gores, former Clippers owner Donald Sterling, Sting and his actress wife Trudie Styler, Goldman Sachs moneyman Andy Gordon, “Dallas” actress Victoria Principal, Greek billionaire Alki David, and tennis champ John McEntroe with his ’80s rocker wife Patty Smyth.

Moelis, 62, has been a player in the high-stakes world of investment banking for 40+ years, initially under Michael Milken at the now-defunct Drexel Burnham Lambert bank. In 2007, he founded his own own firm, Moelis & Company, which now has upwards of 900 employees and 17 offices globally. Some of the Wharton grad’s notable career milestones include handling the record $2 billion sale of the Dodgers in 2012, and advising Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company on the biggest IPO debut in history.

Moelis and longtime wife Julie have been part-time Malibu residents since 1996, when the couple tossed out $3.2 million for the house that sits right next door to their new $21.5 million addition. They also maintain a NYC residence — back in 2018, Moelis paid a whopping $62 million for a penthouse at the 520 Park Avenue skyscraper, along Manhattan’s so-called “Billionaires’ Row.” But the family’s primary home has long been a particularly lavish estate in Beverly Hills, this one with a 15,000-square-foot main house, more than two acres of park-like grounds, a guesthouse and a tennis court.