Here, night life means raccoons
Britney Spears . . . again?
The 25-year-old pop princess, in a custody battle with her former husband -- 29-year-old Kevin Federline -- has leased a Malibu home with the option to buy it in six months. The asking price is slightly more than $9 million.
The seven-bedroom, 8,500-square-foot house is on 5 acres in a canyon with towering trees and park-like grounds. The French-style estate, built in 1942, was just remodeled and has a great room with a fireplace; a master-bedroom suite with two bathrooms; a third-level bonus room; and a basement with a media room and a wine cellar. On the grounds are a guesthouse, pool, spa and room for horses.
It’s a family home with ocean and mountain views, and it’s nowhere near the nightclubs on Sunset Strip the singer liked to frequent with her friends.
Spears should have enough money to buy the property she is leasing, since she sold her Serra Retreat estate, also in Malibu, in August for $10 million.
That home, on 1.5 acres, had a dance/workout room, recording studio and “endless entertainment possibilities,” according to the Multiple Listing Service. The seven-bedroom, 9,200-square-foot house is in a gated community.
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Writer turns page with sale of home
The Pacific Palisades home that Basketball Hall of Famer James Worthy and then-wife Angela Wilder bought in 1996, the year they divorced, has been sold for close to $2 million.
The five-bedroom, ocean-view house is in the Summit, a gated community with three tennis courts, a pool, a spa, a gym and -- appropriately -- a basketball court. The couple bought the 3,200-plus-square-foot home as a place for Wilder and the couple’s two children to live.
The house has four bathrooms, a granite kitchen, oak and hardwood floors, and a large master-bedroom suite with a sitting room and plantation shutters.
Now that the children are grown, Wilder, 45, wants to focus on her writing career in a smaller home. She wrote the book “Powerful Mate Syndrome,” published in 2004, leading to appearances on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” “20/20,” “48 Hours” and CNN. Now she is writing a sequel.
Worthy, 46, played small forward with the Lakers and is now an in-studio analyst for Lakers telecasts on KCAL-TV Channel 9 in Los Angeles and for NBA and college basketball highlights on KCBS-TV Channel 2, also in Los Angeles.
Lauren Polan of Coldwell Banker, Pacific Palisades, represented Wilder in selling the Pacific Palisades home.
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Not the seat of power, but close
Few folks have a mayor as a neighbor, but such has been the life for veteran actor-director Al Morgenstern, who owns the only home immediately adjacent to Getty House, the official residence of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.
Now, Morgenstern has put the 1923 Mediterranean and its guesthouse on the market at close to $3 million. The home, in Windsor Square, has high ceilings, heavy cornice moldings, a coffered ceiling and original tile. Morgenstern and his wife, Loretta, moved into the main house in 1972. Loretta, an actress, died in 2005.
In the ‘50s and ‘60s, Getty Oil Co. bought many houses in the area adjacent to the old Getty Mansion at Irving and Wilshire boulevards. That mansion was made famous in the 1950 film “Sunset Blvd.”
Richard Stanley at Coldwell Banker, Los Feliz, has the listing.
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A small wrinkle for ‘big brother’
Emmy Award winner Brad Garrett, who played Ray Romano’s big brother on the CBS series “Everybody Loves Raymond” and now costars in the Fox sitcom “ ‘Til Death” with Joely Fisher, may be feeling the pinch of the slowed-down market.
Garrett, 47, put his 10,300-square-foot compound on 1.2 acres in Hidden Hills on the market at $9,495,000 about six months ago. He recently dropped the asking price to $8,790,000.
The luxurious French Country complex has six bedrooms, eight bathrooms, a theater, playhouse, gym, wine room, guesthouse, six-car garage and a pool.
Anita Rich and John Giddins of the Rich Group, Keller Williams in West Hollywood, are the co-listing agents with Jason Weiss of the same firm.
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Enough to buy a chocolate factory
Gene Wilder, the wonderfully zany actor-writer, has sold his Bel-Air home for slightly less than $2.73 million.
The ranch-style house, with three bedrooms and 4 1/2 bathrooms in 2,700 square feet, was promoted as “an extraordinary remodel opportunity.” The house is a one-story with an open floor plan and a guest cottage.
Wilder appeared in New York earlier this month as the co-host for a screening of “Young Frankenstein” to benefit Gilda’s Club, a nonprofit support network to raise cancer awareness named for his actress wife, Gilda Radner, who died of ovarian cancer in 1989.
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To see previous columns on celebrity realty transactions, go to latimes.com/hotproperty.
