Thursday, December 1, 2011

Rumor Has It...

...newly svelte Oscar- and Grammy-winning former American Idol Jennifer Hudson has signed the necessary papers to purchase a titanic 12,000 square foot mansion in Burr Ridge, IL, an affluent suburb about a half hour drive southwest of Chicago's Loop.

The very trad mansion (shown above) was originally listed in 2006 at $4,200,000 and the listing agent told real estate gossip Dennis Rodkin at Chicago Magazine "It's an over-$3 million house." Well, apparently it's not since the hulking house was last listed at $2,795,000 and although the purchase price has yet to be revealed it seems unlikely Miss Hudson would agree to pay more than the asking price. But then again, what do we really know about anything?

Listing information still available online shows the 16-room stone-built mansion has 6 bedrooms, 6 full and 2 half bathrooms, 5 fireplaces, heated garage space for 6 cars, 2 laundry rooms, a fully finished walk-out basement, and a huge bonus room tucked up into the eaves on the third floor. Additional spaces include an impress-the-guests style foyer with floating curved staircase, formal living and dining rooms, a library, colossal eat-in kitchen lit by three identical chandeliers, a double-height family room, and in basement area, a game room and home theater. Outdoor space is severely limited to a landscaped front yard, a large rear motor court accessed via a porte-cochere and a wee sliver of a backyard mostly taken up by a free-form dining terrace.

The kids over at Curbed Chicago amalgamated a slew of photos of the large and luxurious but perfectly ordinary mansion a person could ever want to see.

photo: Bing

20 comments:

Pudenda Shenanigans said...

and people wonder why there are so many starlet-singer-wannabes trying for their time in the limelight. J-Hu, successes notwithstanding, is not a major talent doing epic things, yet there she goes -- off buying "$3million" dollar homes. shrug. More power to her I guess.

Anonymous said...

She should have bought in Lake Forest, much nicer, quiet and more private.

Anonymous said...

Jhud is a major talent with a dynamic voice. She takes care of her voice, she'll be around for longevity. Don't know where you have been. It's okay if you don't like her music.

She's low key and obviously buying this home in Illinois and not LA resonates that. In LA, the home would have been almost double.

Anonymous said...

Wasn't she nominated for an Oscar?

Anonymous said...

What a miserable hodge-podge of styles. Norman+ Texan+So. California+???. Difficult to tell.

Anonymous said...

She's a Chicago girl, and given her family tragedy and that it's a free country, can't she can buy whatever she wants, whenever she wants and not pay mind to anything anyone says ever? Go JHud.

Anonymous said...

@Pudenda- I think winning an Oscar is pretty epic, but that's just me.

Anonymous said...

To Pudenda Shenanigans: How long were you in the rehab facility? Perhaps you missed Miss Hudson winning a Grammy and an Oscar among other accolades. Her career isn't epic? Puleezz.

angie said...

I agree 11:02. Last I heard it's the pinnacle.

11:07, yes, and she won the Oscar too.

I hope she's happy there, however I can't help but wonder why she bought a home with no back yard when she's got a very young boy now.

Anonymous said...

Pshaw, what are you people talking about. Her career has not been epic at all. I mean all she did was win a SAG award, a Grammy, an Oscar and a bunch of other awards. People do that all the time don't you know. lol

Anonymous said...

Actually, I think that the yard is a good size for that area. Remember in LA there would be no yard with that size of a house.

But somehow there would be a pool squeezed in. LOL. :)

Anonymous said...

Good for this Ms. Hudson. She has the money to buy what she wants and live exactly where SHE wants. Nice home. I am sure she will be very happy.

Anonymous said...

12:14 that house is sitting on at least 3/4-1 acre of land, more than enough land for her son to run around and play on and then there are the fun woods in the back that he and his friends can go play in. As 1:58 said in LA there would be almost no land and in NY there would be absolutely none. lol

Anonymous said...

Well, bless that nice Miss Hudson for sticking to her roots in the Midwest, and not going off and becoming some kinda toxic Hollywood type.

midTN said...

***

The house is certainly a hodge-podge of "styles", but Ms. Hudson is pure class all the way.

***

Anonymous said...

Am I the only one who finds this chick fake? It always seems like she's *acting* nice, but I suspect once the cameras cut her smile drops and she becomes a mean betch. It's just the feeling I get from her.

Anonymous said...

P.S. Why does ONE person need 12,000sqft? That's pretty gross.

Anonymous said...

Again, 6:16 PM, it's a free country. And she's not one person, she has a partner, a baby and an extended family in Chicago. And again, whose biz is it of ours. It's a free country where achievement is and should be rewarded by doing whatever the frig you want within legal schmegal bounds of course.

I said good day, sir.

Calgary Realtors said...

If Jennifer Hudson is 'not a major talent' after winning a Grammy and an Oscar, I would think there are only a couple 'major talents' on the planet....according to Pudenda.

Jennifer said...

Pretty much all of her family and probably most of her old friends live on the South Side, Lake Forest is a 45 minute drive from the Loop on a good day so I can't see her wanting to live so far away from them all.

And tbh I don't think she'd have felt at home here in Lake Forest, for several reasons, but most especially because they don't take too kindly to new money around here.