The president of the five-campus University of Massachusetts system has purchased a $975,000 condo on the Boston waterfront, records show.

Martin T. Meehan recently closed on a unit in the luxury Harbor Towers complex at 65 E. India Row, according to the Suffolk Registry of Deeds online database. The purchase was first reported by the Lowell Sun.

The former representative and UMass Lowell chancellor could not be reached for comment Friday night.

He took out two mortgages on the property over the summer, one for $780,000 and another for $97,500, according to the registry records.

Meehan’s spokesman, Jeffrey Cournoyer, said Meehan’s “office is downtown and he has a work-related event more nights than not. He was renting and decided to buy.’’

Meehan’s current annual salary is $525,000, according to state payroll records.

Robert L. Caret, his predecessor at the helm of the UMass system, last year collected $1,345,000 from the sale of his Boston Harbor-front condominium that he bought four years earlier for $880,000.

Caret drew on his taxpayer-funded housing stipend to pay the taxes, fees, and monthly costs of the mortgage before collecting the six-figure profit.

The transaction was all aboveboard. His contract provided him with a $60,000-a-year housing stipend, an amount that helped cover the payments on his $704,000 mortgage, city property taxes, and condo fees.

It is not clear whether Meehan plans to sell his condo when his UMass tenure ends.

Frank Phillips and Tim Logan of the Globe Staff contributed to this report.