Billionaire Charles Schwab Inspires Son To Build Stunning Surf Community in Mexico—Where He’s Already Sold $60 Million Worth of Homes

While Charles Schwab made his name—and billions of dollars—revolutionizing the brokerage industry, his son is making waves of a different kind: by building a surfing community on the coast of Mexico.

Through his private real estate investment firm Meriwether Companies, Michael Schwab is a partner in developing Cabo Real Surf Club in Los Cabos, Mexico, set to open in 2026. It will have North America’s first Endless Surf wave basin, which will be 4 acres and about 800 feet long.

There are a handful of wave basins in the world, says Schwab. But this is no splash pool. The waves will produce up to 25-second rides with heights up to 7 feet.

The basin will offer up 400 customizable waves per hour—from small beginner waves increasing to a “crushing barrel” that a pro would find challenging—for the 200 or so families who will live in luxury homes in the 3,000-acre, master-planned community.

The basin is so impressive that even 17-year-old surfing phenom Erin Brooks has bought a home along it.

“She wants a place to live in a warm climate, where she can surf every day no matter what,” Schwab tells Realtor.com®.

Brooks adds that she chose to buy a home at the Cabo Real Surf club because it offers “the ultimate amenities” for her “surf-focused lifestyle.”

“The private, world-class wave pool is a game changer; and the fitness center, beach club, tennis courts, and golf course provide everything I need to stay in peak shape, elevate my surfing, and make the most of every day,” she says.

How the wave basin works

The wave basin replicates the experience of surfing or bodyboarding in a controlled, man-made environment. The wave technology uses a caisson system powered by 250-horsepower motors that pushes off a surfable wave into the basin that looks like a lake. There are a handful of technologies and companies that make wave basins.

Cabo Real Surf Club’s basin cost about $35 million to build.

While the open ocean can offer a myriad of unpleasant surfing experiences—waves that never arrive, unruly crowds, boards that can bonk you on the head, not to mention sharks—basins can always produce the perfect wave.

“It’s more fun this way,” says Schwab, 49. “You can’t put a bunch of people on that wave, just you.”

Though professional surfers, like Brooks, might find Cabo Real the ideal place to live, the master-planned community is built with average families in mind—from the member who can handle a “barrel” to the one who is just learning and needs a gentle “ankle biter.”

“The market is not the pro surfers,” Schwab adds. “The market is the aspirational surfers. When you get that family there, their minds are blown. And their surfing life has begun.”

Levels of surfing in the basin will be split up into time zones, with some hours for beginners, some for experts, and everything in between.

“Some waves will start in the center, some from the side. We’ll have full waves. Some will be point breaks,” Schwab explains.

Over $60 million worth, or 20 percent, of the club’s total offerings of homes have been sold. Land lots start at $1 million and cap out at about $8 million for customizable homes. Then, there are surf casitas that start from the mid-$2 millions. There are also boardwalk homes along the basin starting at $4 million and capping at about $6 million. Over half of “phase 1” homes, those that have been offered to the market, have sold.

Schwab, a veteran surfer, has already grabbed his own crib in front of the basin—a two-level boardwalk home. Yes, he paid full price.

Thanks, Dad

In 2012, it was Schwab’s famous father, Charles, who gave him the idea of investing in surfing communities.

“He said, ‘Michael, why don’t you invest in what you’re passionate about?’ I said, ‘Dad, that’s surfing,’ thinking he’s not going to approve,” recalls Schwab. “He goes, ‘I know.’ I thought, ‘OK, wait, he’s not going to look down on me for investing in what I’m passionate about?’ And thank God he said that to me, because the next year, Kelly asked me to invest.”

That would be Kelly as in Kelly Slater, one of the most famous surfers in the world. Schwab was an early investor in his Kelly Slater Wave Company. In January, Slater broke ground on his own surfing community in Austin, TX.

Matthew McConaughey, Drew Brees, and Tony Hawk are among the interested parties for properties and memberships at the Austin Surf Club, according to the Austin Business Journal, citing public and private documents. The club has thus far been more secretive than Schwab’s, with no renderings available.

Schwab even credits that chat with his billionaire dad for the Cabo Real community.

“I thought, ‘OK, I don’t want to build a golfing community. I want to build a wave basin community,'” he recalls. “You always want your Dad to be proud of you. And when he said that, it was like, I’m off to the races. I’m very happy I listened to him.”

Now Schwab hopes to build at least 10 Surf Clubs around the world.

“There’s an evolution going on where people want to be more active and healthy,” he says of the increasing popularity of adventure sports vacations. “It’s more like, let’s have an experience rather than buy a kid another toy.”

But for those not interested in surfing, the development will offer amenities such as a golf club, skateboard course, racquetball center, splash pad, and children’s playgrounds. Not to mention, the beaches of the Sea of Cortez are a short walk away.

Surfers, like golfers, are particularly devoted to their chosen sport. Schwab came to surfing late, especially for a native Californian. Although he had tried the sport as a teen, it didn’t stick until he was 30 and living in Malibu, CA. After that, he was hooked—or stoked, as a surfer might say.

“It’s the glide,” he explains of the appeal. “You’re catching energy that nature produced in a storm thousands of miles away. That energy is coming towards you on some beach, and you’re putting yourself in the right position to where it breaks, and you’re gonna take off on it and harness that energy.

“The glide is really what it’s all about.”