Thursday, May 9, 2013

Rumor Has It...

...that international music industry superstars Beyoncé and Jay-Z dropped $41 million (or maybe $45 million) to buy the palatial Malibu (CA) mansion of another music industry icon: Cher.

Everybody knows Cher has had her walled, gated and heavily fortified ocean view estate on the bluffs near Pepperdine University on an off the market since at least mid-2008 when it popped up for sale with a $45,000,000 price tag. The price was later dropped to $41 million.

Listing information from a few years ago—and other online resources—shows the 13,126 square foot Gothic-inspired Italian Renaissance extravaganza sits on 1.72 fully landscaped and heavily fortified acres and includes six bedrooms and seven bathrooms, a stone-walled entrance hall, elaborately dressed living and dining rooms, a den, an office, a home theater and a fitness facility. Your Mama imagines there's a secret, temperature controlled room for Cher's many wigs somewhere up in there, don't y'all?

At the front of the house a grid of mature palm trees shades the long driveway and a fully walled tennis court sits on top of an underground parking garage. The back of the house opens up to various terraces, patios, loggias and an infinity edge swimming pool all with panoramic views up and down the Malibu coast line.

Cher had the Ron Wilson-decorated residence photographed for the August 2002 issue of Architectural Digest but we imagine—and hope—that she may have made some alterations to the lavish day-core since then. Then again, maybe she hasn't touched a thing.

For the record, these rumors of Cher selling to Beyoncé have been floating around since at least January (2013) and Your Mama has no inside intel about Cher's alleged sale to Sasha Fierce and Jay-Z. We remain—to say the least—skeptical. Property records do not yet reflect a transfer of ownership and, children, keep in mind that Your Mama has many times been told by various players in the high stakes world of high price L.A. real estate that Cher has at least twice turned down offers in excess of $40 million. It also seems a very costly and unnecessarily high maintenance choice as a West Coast pied a terre for the East Coast-based couple who, in addition to a huge penthouse in New York City's TriBeCa 'hood, own a handful of condos in an ocean front building in Miami Beach (FL) plus a couple of estates in Houston (TX) that—as far as we can tell—are used primarily by her family. The power pair have long been rumored to own a mansion in or around Scarsdale, NY but, honestly children, we don't know anything about that.

Stranger things have happened in the wacky world of celebrity real estate but, at this point, we're not betting either of our long-bodied bitches this wild and wooly rumor of Beyonce and Jay-Z setting down real estate roots in Cher's massive Malibu manse has any veracity. Remember, puppies, back in February there were rumors and reports they wanted to buy Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch. Remember that bit of celebrity real estate cray-cray?

Stay tuned...

photo: Pacific Coast News