Thanks to the fine folks at SF Luxe, Your Mama has learned that a sprawling Silicon Valley estate in hoity-toity Woodside, CA just sold for—buckle your real estate safety belts, butter beans—a mind-numbing and record-breaking $117,500,000.
The seller, according to previous reports and property records we peeped, was San Francisco-based financier Tully Friedman. The deep-pocketed buyer, shielded behind a mysterious limited liability company, has yet to be revealed but Your Mama hears through the Silicon Valley real estate gossip grapevine that the buyer might be a Korean banker who—so the story goes—bought the property as a summer getaway for his wife—or maybe his mistress—who may want to embark on some sort of remodel.
Bueller? Bueller? Anyone? Bueller?
The Neoclassical main mansion, according to noted classical architect Allen Greenberg's website, occupies "an elaborate hilltop garden" and reflects a "strong Palladian tradition" that's " planned around hyphens and dependencies and features a double volume, elliptical garden room." We don't really know what an architectural hyphen or dependency is but it certainly sounds high fallutin' don't it? The San Mateo County Tax Man shows the house measures 8,930 square feet and contains just four bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms but we really can't vouch for the accuracy of those numbers.
The nearly nine acre gated estate also includes acres of elaborate and meticulously maintained formal gardens, at least one reflecting pool, broad expanses of painstakingly manicured lawns, lots and lots of parking and a swimming pool complex with spa and a pool house Your Mama would bet is twice the size of our own house.
The super-sized transaction, which went down very quietly in late November (2012), makes it the most expensive private residence in California and it's likely to be the second or third highest price ever paid for a private home in the United States. Chicago hedge fund fat cat Ken Griffin and wife Anne Dias-Griffin allegedly and possibly coughed up $130 million for a quartet of contiguous properties in Palm Beach late in 2012 and the 124,000 acre Broken O Ranch in Montana—last listed for $132,500,000—was acquired late last year by multi-billionaire businessman Stan Kroenke and wife Ann for an undisclosed amount believed to be in the nine figures. Ann (Walton) Kroenke, for the record, is the daughter of Wal-Mart co-founder Bud Walton.
The wily SF Luxe folks dug up a small cache photos of the property and is it ever a doozy worth having a look-see at. Run don't walk before they're forced by an angry army of attorneys to take them down!
NOTE FROM YOUR MAMA (01-01-13): The Los Angeles Times subsequently suggested the buyer may be Masayoshi San, the CEO of SoftBank and one of Japan's richest men with a fortune in the eight billion dollar range.
aerial images: Google
Swanky!
ReplyDeleteAnnual tax bill: $1,468,750.00!!!
Now Mama, don't be playin' pig-ignorant with your children; you know very well that the hyphens are those cute little wings/hallways that connect the dependencies to the main body of the house
ReplyDeleteA lovely pseudo-Georgian colonial that would look right at home in almost any locale (except, perhaps, the desert).
I always thought that Greenberg's work was on a par with Oliver Cope; sure puts Richard Landry to shame...
Oops she did it again!!!
ReplyDeleteSomebody give Candy Spelling a Gin and Tonic....cause she just got served!
ReplyDeleteWow. Just Wow! What an amount. I feel the buyers overpaid, as epic as the estate might be.
Is there something I'm missing? THAT cost that much? It looks like a $10m home tops!!!
ReplyDeleteIT'S AN ERROR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteI'm reading it could be an error at the properly assessment office.
No way in hell is that house $117m. $17.5M is more like it.
no it didn't. don't believe this at all. this particular plot was purchased for $8m in 2005, and this structure probably was $3m tops to build.
ReplyDeletefor comparison, there is much larger 11 acre lot across the street listed at only 29m.
that's a lot of money to spend on your pu$$y
ReplyDeleteIf the property was bought for a Korean woman, I'm going to assume she'll convert a section of the house into a plastic surgery center.
ReplyDeleteI'm throwing down and saying this is another addition to the Ellison portfolio. His compound is less than a mile down the road and he and his daughter Megan have both been shuffling their property portfolios around lately. Korean? I'm not buying that info unless it's Fred Chen's new place since he sold his other one in Los Altos in a high priced deal last year.
ReplyDeleteWillLDS
This NOT the second most home transaction in 2012 . Ken and Anne Dias Griffin paid $130 million for their oceanfront compound in December.
ReplyDeletePLEASE MAKE CORRECTIONS
I know this area well, as it is my hometown. I don't believe that price for a second unless it comes with a mountain of gold bars in the den. Just no way. There are many greater homes and better chunks of land in comparable areas of town. It just doesn't add up. I think it is off by about $105,000,000. Something is amiss.
ReplyDeleteForgive me LGB; however, this pseudo-Georgian is a bit too pseudo for the Rabbi's taste: She experiences the enclosed semi-circular second story and third floor eyebrow dormer together as visually heavy above the delicate entrance portico below. Furthermore, from the exterior the double volume elliptical garden room gives the Rabbi the absolute shivers, as it reminds her of San Francisco's Columbarium. Finally, the Rabbi always thinks of architectural hyphens as structural conjunctions joining the smoke house, summer kitchen, laundry, and estate office to the main residence.
ReplyDeleteRabbi Hedda LaCasa
Montana Jones luxuriated in the house that three divorces to increasingly wealthy men had built. The couches, the dining room, the pool house and the library were all stained that familiar shade of 'semen beige' so that the carnal desires that fixated Montana could be satiated at a moment's notice.
ReplyDelete"I'm brilliant," she cooed to herself, "the money I've saved on cleaning the spunk off my ceilings alone has kept me in the black!"
She stared outside at the formal gardens, wondering what it all meant? Not a damn thing she decided, not one damn thing.
I guarantee you that this is an error and mama will come back with an update. $17.5m.
ReplyDeleteThe ONLY way this house sold for 117m is if it came with a vault filled with gold, and andy warhors and picassos. if you're from around the area you would know that this is a very average home. far grander homes on grander lots for 10% of this mistyped price.
ridiculous.
I heard Nude Green Leaves was in the basement!
ReplyDeleteKen Griffin paid that for 4 houses, not just one. Doesn't count
ReplyDelete....and it's just speculation that he bought them all from the palm beach paper. there is no proof that he bought them.
ReplyDeleteIt's not a mistake. Prices there are insane -- a parcel of land that's a little bit bigger than this is on the market for al ost $30M. And a home in the area that's only on an acre of land just went on the market for $35 million.
ReplyDeleteOh hunny, it's not speculation. It's pure fact. Ken went to high school here in Boca Raton and he's already been around to brag to his old lady-love.
ReplyDeleteprices in woodside are not insane. there are homes 3x the size of this on the market on bigger lots listed of under 30m. most homes in the area are in the 3-10m range.
ReplyDeleteI don't buy this for a minute.
ReplyDeleteIf you look on Google maps, there's some kind of big construction going on behind the main estate, though it looks to be the same property? Anyone know what they did back there?
ReplyDeleteTom, I hope you're still in love with the place, 'cause there are maybe 10 or 20 people on the planet that might be interested in and could afford to buy this thing.
ReplyDeleteAnother display of obscene wealth in the nation with the highest level of inequality in the advanced world. Where are Marx and Lenin when you need them? The idea of a rebellion of the masses needs to be revived.
ReplyDelete11;47 it would be better if the annual tax bill were, like, 25 million or more. Don't tell me they can't afford it. Sop up some of that loose cash and spread it around.
ReplyDeleteIf this is true, then it has me wondering just what Ellison's Woodside Japanese compound would go for if it was to change hands?
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis house is fantastic and the gardens are magnificent!
ReplyDeleteMakes sense that it would sell to a Korean. Looks like the moneyed folks of CA are selling and getting out and the only folks looking to buy are those who will use these fabulous homes as vacation getaways rather than as a primary residence, whereby they would fall under the taxing purview of the Calmunists like 7:07 PM up above.
ReplyDeleteThis report is hard to believe, and so I don't know if I do.
ReplyDeleteBut I do know that 17,000 children die every day from famine and poverty. One billion people 'live' on less than $1 per day and another billion people 'live' on less than $2 per day.
Call me naive, but it saddens me deep in my heart to even consider that there are people out there who would rather throw their money away and live in an ugly, sad house than use those extra dollars to improve the lives of the several billion people who are suffering and days away from their deathbeds.
Anyone who spends $117 million dollars for a house, especially one as ugly as this, is either desperate, brain dead and/or being severely abused by greedy and incompetent advisors.
Which makes me realize that I ought to pray for these poor rich people as well as the millions and eventually billions of humans who will die as a result of the greed and excess that these poor rich people represent.
They're foreign and putting cash into hard assets. Many Asians are shocked by how cheap property is over here. There's no need to get so philosophical about it.
ReplyDeleteWith all due respect...
ReplyDeleteThis property (8 acres) did not sell for the published price. Anyone who knows the market knows this would be highly anomalous. It is far more likely that the assessor's office made a scrivener's error in reporting the price.
You don't get to be rich by being an idiot with your money.
No, my dears, I am not feeling "served", angry, or bitter. Far from it, in fact. There are mansions aplenty in the US and a high sale price in one will boost the value of the rest!
ReplyDeleteThe fact remains that the Manor is the most valuable mansion in California, and very likely the US. Did this sell for more? Yes, but what's going to happen when the current owner wants to eventually offer it for resale? It will be lucky to go for even half what he paid, whereas the Manor will continue to appreciate.
One is a large house, the other is a future historical monument - there's simply no comparison.
it looks cheap...blah
ReplyDeleteWoodside has notoriously strict building restrictions so to build this house (if even possible anymore) it would take up to 10 years for permits and such.
ReplyDeleteTherefore the price seems very high but for perhaps the most prestigious address in Silicon Valley it does make a bit more sense if you want a mega-mansion tomorrow.
Wow, what an incredible property. Not sure that it's worth 9 figures, but Silicon Valley is certainly growing in popularity for estates and mansions as the business and start-up bubble continues to grow. My company does quite a bit of video production work out in that area, such a beautiful setting.
ReplyDelete- Susan from Maverick Productions