Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Let's Talk Tori (Spelling) For a Minute

Ever since Tinseltown scion Tori Spelling* left her first husband for the then also married actor Dean McDermott their lives have been a topsy-turvy whirlwind of highly publicized pregnancies, vapid if reasonably popular reality television programs, salacious tabloid rumors and reports of eating disorders and tight financial circumstances, and several multi-million dollar real estate deals gone sour.

Tori married Dean in 2006 and together they have owned or leased more than half a dozen homes all over the western areas of Los Angeles. In February 2008 the couple coughed up $2.275 million for a 3,300 square foot house in the affluent Little Holmby 'hood between Century City and Westwood. They sold the house in December (2008) for $2.3 million. Several months earlier they spent $2.945 million for a six bedroom mock-Med macmansion just north of Ventura Boulevard in Encino that they had professionally decorated and sold, in December 2011, for $2.5 million. Two quick clicks on Your Mama's bejeweled abacus shows that comes to a pocketbook punishing $445,000 loss not counting carrying costs, improvements, and real estate fees.

The rapidly procreating pair may (or may not) have been in a hurry to sell in Encino because, on a bit of a lark, in the fall of 2011 they paid $2.4 million for a 1.73 acre spread in the celebrity-popular Point Dume area of Malibu. They added organic gardens and a chicken coop (and whatever else). Alas, they immediately caught a classic case of The Celebrity Real Estate Fickle and sold the Malibu mini-farm just a year later for just $2,177,000, a smaller but still brutal $233,000 loss that came quick on the heels of their near half million dollar loss in Encino.

From Malibu the Spelling-McDermotts moved to Thousand Oaks where they leased—for somewhere close to $15,000 per month—a lavish and sprawling, 9,000-ish square foot, single-story manse with six bedrooms and 6.5 bathrooms in the affluent and guard gated Sherwood Country Club. We're not sure exactly how long the Spelling-McDermotts shacked up in Thousand Oaks but we do know that sometime in the recent past the family decamped back to Encino where, according to Your Mama's sources and other resources, they leased a chunky, faux-timbered mock-Tudor macmansion on a cul-de-sac above the Encino Reservoir last listed for lease at $10,500 per month.

Just before Christmas the gossip glossies blared with (no doubt devastating) reports that in early December, while in Canada promoting Chopped Canada, 47-year old Mister McDermott stepped out on 40-year old Miz Spelling with a 28- year old gal who told Us that Mister McDermott told her his marriage was sexless. (Good grief.) None-the-less, our long-time informant, Mirakle Mike—a man who tends to reliably know something about these sorts of things—told us that the couple are still shacked up together in their new rental in Encino although there are fairly recent gossip glossy reports that Dean hasn't been seen around much lately.

Listing details Your Mama managed to conjure up out of the internets show the rabidly ersatz two-story residence contains six bedrooms and seven bathrooms in just over 6,600 square feet of undeniably "luxurious" but depressingly uninspired interior space. Listen, children. Contrary to popular opinion Your Mama does not like to cast decorative aspersions like rice at a wedding. But, hunnies, let's be honest. Miz Spelling's team of nice-gay and/or lady decorators can gussy this place up at great expense with some dernier cri wallpaper and au courant curtains but—to paraphrase a pithy pal who shall remain nameless— you can put a Chanel suit on a pig but you still only got a pig in a godawful expensive luncheon outfit, you know? Anyways...

Digital marketing materials Your Mama peeped and perused indicate the house has—as one can most assuredly count on in a house of this size and cost in this location—a grandiose, double-height foyer with an attention grabbing medallion pattern inlaid marble floor and a depressingly cliché, 1980s-era prom picture perfect curved staircase.

The step-down formal living room has medium-toned hardwood floors, a ceiling crossed with a bunch of skinny little wood beams, and a gawky (and probably cast concrete) corner fireplace. The adjacent formal dining room can comfortably seat 16, according to marketing materials, and also has skinny wood beams on the ceiling and medium-toned wood on the floor.

The floors switch to stone tile (or possibly faux-stone porcelain tiles) in the family-sized center island kitchen and adjoining breakfast area. The two-toned cabinets have double raised panel doors and lots of carved detailing, the granite counter tops have rounded three-tiered edges, and the appliances are all high-quality stainless steel. The nearby family room has several sets of glass doors that lead out to the backyard entertainment and recreation spaces and a separate game room does double duty as a nine-seat home theater with 110-inch drop down screen plus a fridge-equipped wet bar shoved uncomfortably up into the corner on an elevated seating platform next to a row of theater style recliner lounges.

The spacious, second floor master suite has a vaulted and beamed ceiling, elaborate drapery systems that involve valances, shades and curtains, lots of built-in cabinetry, and wall-to-wall carpeting the color of wet sand. There's also a fitted, bedroom-sized walk-in closet/dressing room and a huge bathroom that veers perilously close to hideous with a super-sized step-up soaking tub set into a wide, windowed bay trimmed in pleated and swagged light camel-colored fabric panels that puddle uselessly around the tub where they're sure to occasionally fall into the bubble bath or otherwise be soaked by water sploshing up over the bathtub's rim. Anyways...

The rear facade is so redonkulously unspeakable it's hysterical and looks a little too much to Your Mama like a budget-friendly motel in Solvang, CA. The good-sized and mostly flat backyard wraps around the house and includes a half court basketball court and a fair-sized patch of grass where perhaps Miz Spelling will install an elaborate jungle gym for her quartet of toddlers and tots, and an open air poolside cabana.

For what it's worth, Your Mama found online evidence the house was listed for sale on the open market as recently as April 2012 for $2.4 million, reduced from it's original $2.6 million ask. But, of course, even if they can afford it—and we really have no idea if they could or could not—it is Your Mama's unsolicited and utterly meaningless opinion that given the current hurly-burley of their all-to-public personal lives and their costly previous real estate failures it would hardly make sense for the McDermott-Spellings to splash out another couple million bucks for a house.

*If somehow you don't know, Tori Spelling is the eldest child and only daughter of deceased television supermogul Aaron Spelling and his still-living widow, Candy. Miz Spelling—we're talking Tori here—grew up in a civic center-sized house in the hoity-toity Holmby Hills area that her parents custom built with creature comforts such as a barber shop, a bowling alley, and a doll museum. The Widda Spelling sold the 56,000 square foot megamansion—which they ever-so-modestly dubbed The Manor—a couple years ago to preposterously pampered 20-something year old Formula One racing heiress Petra Ecclestone for $85 million. Mister Spelling passed in 2006 and (in)famously left the vast majority of his estimated $300 million estate to his wife while Tori and her younger brother each reportedly received less than a million dollars. (Tori herself says it was $800,000.)

listing photos: John Aaroe Group

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Candy Spelling is sitting up in her pink penthouse like "yawn. I'm going marble shopping."

Anonymous said...

While I am not a fan of Tori, she has frankly admitted that she is broke and that she cannot afford the lifestyle that she once enjoyed. She has been honest with her struggles to come to terms with that, and the mistakes she has made.

Say what you will about her, it's refreshing to see somebody face their problems and take responsibility for them.

Anonymous said...

I am a fan of the Tori. She's as screwed up as the rest of us, and she owns it. I like that. Hopefully soon, she will find the confidence within to rid herself of the long ago handsome husband.
When he is gone, the good Jewish Mother will return her daughter to the safety of the family funds. Rabbi, Rabbi?

The house is a horror. The view of the canyon and lake from the back is gorgeous.

Anonymous said...

e gawds. hope her mama sees this and takes pity.

Anonymous said...

Just re-watched selling spelling manor and I don't think Tori will be seeing a dime from mommy anytime soon. The interaction between them at candys Carlyle rental was super uncomfortable to watch. I wonder if Tori has ever been to the century. I haven't seen it on tv, so it's doubtful.

Sandpiper said...



I just got my eye gel mask from out of the freezer.

Anonymous said...

Tori's taste is almost as bad as her mother's.

Anonymous said...

I don't think this house is THAT bad.

I think they should've stayed in the first home they bought in LA together - the one they moved to after leaving the B&B they leased. That house was gorgeous, and it was fun watching its transformation on her reality show.

I'm also a fan of hers.

Rumours abound that she's not interested in buying in case Dean does file for divorce, leaving her exposed financially.

Anonymous said...

I must believe these buys were rather her desire to hold onto the marriage than to agree. Confident that it was his pedestrian insistence to spend her money on impulsive real estate.

Anonymous said...

FYI, their first house was not in Little Holmby but in the nearby but far more modest area south of Santa Monica Blvd. Real estate in this area is still pricey due to proximity to Century City, but nowhere near the prices in Little Holmby.

Anonymous said...

on topic: yes, the house is a bit love american style, but the views are lovely and im sure tori is already planning her next move.

off topic: that dean creep better get his sh*t together and knock off his cheating bull. how can a marriage be sexless if all they do is have children? tori's the best thing that ever happened to him and i think she's cool for being honest about what's going on instead of pretending to front like so many other celebs. at least tori has gumption and creativity on her side. her mother should be ashamed of herself for not publicly backing/helping her daughter. aaron spelling left a fortune behind. candy's so greedy. what did candy ever do?

Anonymous said...

Candy used to sell lingerie at an upscale LA department store...so there!LOL.

Unknown said...

I would like to see her house. Anyone know the street name. I live in Encino.

Anonymous said...

3834 Alonzo Avenue

Anonymous said...

The house is as tacky as Spelling & McDermott's tattoos! Can anyone say, Financial Advisor? The amount of cash they have lost on real estate is as almost as cringe worthy as their lack of acting chops. The views are great. I hope Lifetime is picking up the lease payment! LOL!