‘Spelling Manor’: California’s most expensive house with 123 rooms sets new record
It’s an OTT iconic mansion that was built by TV royalty, but made famous thanks to crazy inclusions. And now, it takes the crown as the priciest pad ever sold in California.
It’s the OTT mega mansion built by TV royalty, but made famous thanks to crazy inclusions like rooms just for flower cutting, gift wrapping or keeping silverware.
The palatial pad, which is actually larger than the White House, was once owned by small screen sovereign Aaron Spelling, but is back in the news after selling for an eye-watering $AUD 170 million this week.
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For a while it looked like the regal residence wouldn’t find a buyer with the 2ha estate sitting on (and off) the shelf since 2014, but the largest home in Los Angeles has finally found a mystery purchaser with a big enough bank balance.
It has been listed with various agents and once was asking $285 million, but even with the hefty discount, the home now takes the crown as the priciest pad ever sold in California.
Formerly known as Spelling Manor, now just The Manor, the grand W-shaped home was built in 1991 for Spelling, his wife Candy, as well as their two children Randy and Tori of original Beverly Hills 90210 fame.
If the name Spelling means nothing to you, the producer with the Midas touch created 1970s, 1980s and 1990s TV hits like Dynasty, The Love Boat, Charlie’s Angels and Melrose Place to name a few.
In 2011, after Spelling’s death in 2006, his widow sold the property to Petra Ecclestone, the then 20-something daughter of Formula One billionaire Bernie Ecclestone, for a whopping $120 million in what was reported as an “all-cash deal”.
During Aaron and Candy’s reign, the extravagant estate with 123 rooms featured more than 20 customised rooms including a flower-cutting room, a humidity-controlled silver storeroom, a barbershop, giftwrapping rooms, a French wine and cheese room decorated as a Parisian sidewalk-cafe and a bowling alley. Despite the Spellings only being a family of four, it took 30 staff to run the place.
In the short time Ecclestone called the Holmby Hills address home, she made her own lavish changes including a grand aquarium in the study, a facelift for the basement nightclub and she apparently transformed Candy’s doll collecting room into a health spa.
Additional rooms include a tanning booth, solarium, games room and a cinema.
Oh, but there are also those essential inclusions like 14 bedrooms and 27 bathrooms.
The 650sq m main bedroom suite has its own kitchen, “his and hers” bathrooms and a colossal dressing room.
Out the back the estate has rolling manicured lawns, rose gardens, orchards, koi ponds, several water features, a pool and tennis court plus parking for up to 100 cars.
The exclusive enclave of Holmby Hills is a haven for the world’s most well-known celebrities who buy there for the privacy and prestige.
Past and present residents include Hugh Hefner at the Playboy Mansion, Sonny and Cher, Walt Disney, Barbra Streisand, Frank Sinatra and even Michael Jackson had been renting in the suburb upon his death a decade ago.
While the buyer of The Manor remains unknown, US media has reported that Ecclestone isn’t going far from her former home, but will be moving down on the property ladder.
She has bought amore modest eight-bedroom, 11-bathroom house nearby that is across the street from the home of LA Lakers star LeBron James.
In her hometown of London, however, Ms Ecclestone has a $120 million Chelsea residence.
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Originally published as ‘Spelling Manor’: California’s most expensive house with 123 rooms sets new record