The most expensive home sold in the Richmond area in years is now no more than a pricy pile of rubble.

The 80-year-old mansion at 101 S. Ridge Road, purchased last year by Matthew Goodwin for $5.5 million, was demolished last week.

Midday Thursday, the 7,000-square-foot colonial-style home was no longer visible from the road, as crews used an excavator to pile debris into a dump truck. A detached garage and pool house remained intact on the 6.3-acre property near the University of Richmond.

The work appears to clear the way for a new house to be built on the property, which was purchased last June in an off-market sale by 101 South Ridge Road LLC.

The registered agent for that LLC is Goodwin – son of local philanthropists Bill and Alice Goodwin and a principal at his father’s Riverstone Group, which shares downtown offices with Bill Goodwin’s CCA Industries. Bill and Alice Goodwin own a 12-acre estate next door to the Ridge Road property.

A message left for Matt Goodwin at his office Friday morning was not returned.

A demolition permit filed with Henrico County lists the contractor as John W. Montague Jr., a custom homebuilder based in Manakin-Sabot. The work was estimated to cost $50,000. The excavator displayed signage for Richmond demolition firm S.B. Cox.

Built in 1937, the eight-bedroom, nine-bathroom mansion was one of the priciest home sales, if not the most expensive, in the Richmond area in recent memory. Dover Hall, the 33,000-square-foot “castle of Goochland,” sold in 2013 for $5 million.

Meanwhile, a block away from the Goodwin property, another notable residence recently went under contract: the 19th-century Windward mansion, which was listed last June for $2.9 million. The nearly 10,000-square-foot home, owned by Donna Sharp Suro and relocated from Dinwiddie County nearly a century ago, had a sale pending three weeks ago.