Thursday, November 7, 2013

Megan Ellison Sells Three in The Birds

Between February 2008 and February 2011 software heiress turned increasingly influential movie producer Megan Ellison snatched up three pricey properties on the same elbow-shaped cul-de-sac in The Birds, a spendy and perennially en vogue neighborhood in the mountains directly above L.A.'s bustling and also perennially en vogue Sunset Strip.

Miss Ellison, a wee lamb of 27 years, purchased her first nest in The Birds—the one one the far right in the publicly available aerial image above—from designer Steve Hermann in February 2008 for $12,600,000. The following April (2009) she picked up the property next door, which had also been re-worked by Steven Hermann, from media mogul Byron Allen for $6,250,000 and, finally and somewhat inexplicably, she scooped up the property next door to that in February 2011 for $13,750,000.

A few quick clicks and clacks on Your Mama's bejeweled abacus reveals that young Miss Ellison shelled out a total of $32,600,000 for the houses that are all walled, gated, and very contemporary with vast walls of glass and unobstructed panoramic views over Los Angeles that extend, on a clear day, to the Pacific Ocean and, on a particularly clear day with binoculars, Santa Catalina Island.

In early August, as Your Mama discussed back in mid August, Miss Ellison quietly one of her three Bird Streets properties—the last one she bought for $13.75 million—in an off-market deal to high-tech billionaire Ted Wiatt for $20,500,000. Now comes word, children, that in late October Miss Ellison surreptitiously sold her two other Bird Street properties, one went for $15,375,000 and the other—the one in the middle that she bought from Byron Allen—for $10,875,000.

A few more quick flips and flicks on the abacus shows that, just like her property-hoovering real estate baller father, Miss Ellison has the Midas Touch when it comes to residential real estate. All together Miss Ellison took in a mind-melting $46,750,000 on the sale of the three properties for which she paid a total of $32,600,000. Even those with the most rudimentary of mathematics skills can quite easily determine that lucky lucky lucky—or savvy savvy savvy, depending on how you see it—Miss Ellison's profit came to $14,150,000. Your Mama imagines that even after the upkeep and improvement expenses are subtracted and the taxes and real estate fees paid—with standard 4-6% commissions the real estate fees all by themselves could have easily topped two million clams—Miss Ellison will still walk away with a few million dollars. Not bad work if you can afford it, right?

As if her low seven figure profit (less expenses) weren't enough to boggle y'all real estate minds, stay tuned because here's where this ditty veers towards mind blowing. As previously mentioned (and discussed) Miss Ellison sold one of the properties to billionaire Ted Wiatt. Property records show she sold the other two for a combined $26,250,000 to the same foreign buyer who used a couple of opaque and unimaginatively-named corporate entities with links to offices in Beverly Hills and Monaco to acquire the residences.

Naturally, being the property gossip we are, Your Mama did a little asking around and it wasn't long before our much-appreciated informant Peter Propertyseller pegged the foreign buyer behind the corporate entities as Ashley Tabor, a 30-something year old Englishman and budding media mogul who happens to be the son of billionaire bookmaker, horse breeder and real estate investor Michael Tabor.

The younger Mister Tabor may not be a household name for most tabloid readers in the U.S. but he's may be remembered by the hoi-polloi as the fella who (reportedly) paid Rihanna $2 million to perform at a party last year at the super-posh One Sandy Lane resort in Barbados. The resort, it should be noted, is owned by the elder Mister Tabor and is where celebrity real estate rumor has it native Barbadian cum global pop-priestess Rihanna recently plunked down $22 million for a lavish townhouse mansion. Anyways...

According to Peter Propertyseller, Mister Tabor (the son) intends to raze both residences as does Mister Wiatt. Keep in mind that two of the houses, those on the ends, are less than five years old and the other, the one in the middle, had a down-to-the-studs renovation in the mid-Aught. They are, effectively, nearly new houses. So, if all that's true–and we have no reason not to believe what Peter told us—Misters Tabor and Wiatt together paid nearly fifty million dollar for just the land, much of which is just too steep a slope as to be usable, and will likely spend—what do you think, kittens?—at least another ten or maybe $15 million on construction of new homes?

That, children, is how the world's sickening rich super-rich sometimes spend their oceans of disposable income.

Miss Ellison actually owns a fourth house in The Birds—purchased in late 2011 for $1.8 million, gut renovated, originally listed for $3.75 million, currently listed at $2.99 million, and somewhat curiously in escrow since April (2013)—and in May 2013 she dropped $2.8 million for a wildly idiosyncratic one bedroom and one bathroom apartment at the coveted Police Building on the border between the SoHo and Little Italy 'hoods. We're not the betting type but iffin we were Your Mama would bet both our long-bodied bitches, Linda and Beverly, that Miz Ellison will acquire at least one more apartment in the storied building.

P.S. Peter Propertyseller also snitched to Your Mama that Miss Ellison plans (or may be in the process) of acquiring commercial property in L.A.'s still-kinda-gritty but terribly chic and terrifically expensive Venice community to house her film production offices. He also told us he's heard she's in the market for a new L.A. home in the $20 million range. Rumor and gossip, kids, rumor and gossip.

aerial photo: Bing