Arnolds Seek More Space
ROSEANNE and TOM ARNOLD, whose roller-coaster marriage made headlines last month when she filed for divorce and then dropped the proceedings in the same week, are in escrow to buy a $3-million house next door to their Brentwood home, sources say.
Their offer on the house was accepted in a probate-court hearing in early April, before she filed for divorce. They are expected to take possession of the home in June.
They are buying the house, described as “a very pretty, two-story traditional,” to expand their living compound, sources say.
“I don’t think they are going to tear it down,” a source said, referring to the house that the Arnolds are buying. “To make their existing estate bigger, all they have to do is gate their new property and use the house for guests or as offices,” another source added.
Tom Arnold has said that he uses a Westside condo, where his wife claimed in legal papers that he moved to six months ago, as an office or a writer’s retreat. Arnold, 38, was a comedy writer when the couple was married in 1990. Now he is co-executive producer with his wife, 41, of her top-rated “Roseanne” ABC comedy series and “Tom,” his struggling CBS sitcom.
The Arnolds have wanted larger quarters for some time, sources say. Their current home, which they bought as newlyweds for about $3.5 million, has four bedrooms, a guest house, tennis court and pool, with no room for add-ons.
The couple considered selling their home at $4 million to buy a larger one but then the house next door came on the market, and so they decided to buy it and keep their existing residence, sources say. Built in the 1930s, the house they are buying has five bedrooms and 5 1/2 baths plus a sun room with a balcony overlooking a large back yard with manicured grounds.
The home had been owned by the late Armen Bagdasarian, widow of songwriter Ross S. Bagdasarian Sr., whose 1958 recording of “The Chipmunk Song” sold 4 million copies in seven weeks. The senior Bagdasarian died in 1972. Since then, his son, Ross Jr., has written, produced and played the voices of the chipmunk characters Alvin, Theodore and Simon.
One of the original members of the rock band Chicago, trombonist JAMES PANKOW, has put his Malibu home on the market at $4.5 million.
Pankow, 46, has owned the home since 1975. He decided to sell it, because he is on the road a lot and is “scaling down to a smaller residence,” said listing broker Jack Pritchett of Pritchett Realty in Malibu.
The home, on five acres, has four bedrooms, a sound studio, a party room, two guest houses, a sauna, waterfall, stream, organic garden, tennis court and horse facilities.
Actor ALAN THICKE, who is probably best known for his role as psychiatrist Dr. Jason Seaver in the ABC sitcom “Growing Pains” (1985-1992), has put his Hollywood Hills pied-a-terre on the market at $1.6 million.
Thicke, 46, has been living primarily in a Toluca Lake home with his two teen-age sons, but he has owned the Hollywood home for five years. During that time, he refurbished and redecorated it in Santa Fe style at an estimated cost of more than $600,000, and he had it on the market a couple of times, most recently in 1992 at about $1.8 million.
Thicke, who is getting married in August at his Santa Barbara ranch, just leased out the home but is intent on selling it, sources say. The home, which has city views and a pool, has been described as “a bachelor” or “couple” house.
Rhoda Paramore of Fred Sands’ Hollywood Hills office has the listing.
Baltimore Oriole outfielder BRADY ANDERSON, a former UC Irvine standout, has purchased a 5,000-square-foot mountain retreat at Lake Tahoe for $1.3 million, sources say.
The home, which was built in 1987 and was just remodeled, is on an acre at Incline Village with a view of the lake “and the privacy he was looking for,” said selling broker Doug Irvine of Rancon Real Estate in Temecula.
“We were up there looking for a house for him to buy, and we had exhausted the list of ones for sale,” said Irvine, who played college ball with the 30-year-old Anderson.
The pair continued to drive around and look at houses that appealed to the ballplayer until Irvine said, “This is the last one.” It was cold, and Irvine was tired of walking around in the snow.
“So we stopped, knocked on the door, and the owner said, ‘OK, I’ll sell,’ ” Irvine recalled. During the baseball season, Anderson will continue to live in Baltimore, but he is making the Tahoe house his permanent residence, Irvine said.
Emmy-winning film composer BRUCE BROUGHTON, who is scoring the upcoming Joe Montegna film “Baby’s Day Out,” has just completed a $300,000 remodeling of his contemporary 3,000-square-foot home in Bel-Air, which he purchased in 1989 for $1.1 million, sources say.
