Sly Exits Malibu; Suite Deal for Sajak
SYLVESTER STALLONE has sold his longtime Malibu home for close to its asking price of $3.7 million, sources say.
Stallone, who turned 52 last week, and his wife, model Jennifer Flavin, became parents of a second daughter in June. They also have a 22-month-old daughter. Stallone and Flavin were married in 1997.
The “Rambo” and “Rocky” star last appeared in the acclaimed movie “Cop Land” (1997). Earlier this year, he was researching a film project about Formula 1 racing. He also paid $20,000 for rights to the story of a pastor who works with drug addicts and the homeless in Miami.
Stallone’s primary residence has been in Miami since he completed renovating his home there in the mid-’90s. He hadn’t used his Malibu home much lately, sources say.
He owned the Malibu home since 1985. Built in 1981, the Mediterranean-style house has five bedrooms and 7 1/2 baths. The home, on Broad Beach, includes a two-bedroom guest house, a sauna in the master suite and an ocean-front pool.
Stallone’s Miami house has been on the market since September at $27.5 million. It is listed with Alan Jacobson at Wimbish-Riteway Realtors in Miami.
The 34,000-square-foot home, on 11.7 bay-front acres, includes a main house with four bedroom suites, two guest houses, a boat house, two fitness areas, a screening room, man-made lake, shooting range and staff quarters.
Stallone had a longtime home in the Beverly Hills area but sold it in 1997.
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PAT SAJAK, Emmy-winning host of the syndicated game show “Wheel of Fortune,” has leased one of the 160 luxury suites at the $300-million Staples Center, the downtown L.A. arena where the Lakers, Clippers and Kings will play.
When it opens in fall 1999, the center also will have concerts, family shows and other events. A bid was just submitted for the center to host the 2002 U.S. Figure Skating Championships, and there has been talk of the Grammy Awards being held there in 2000.
Sajak, 51, leased his 12-seat 400-square-foot suite for five years at $247,500 a year.
He was interested in a suite because he enjoyed using one at Camden Yards in Baltimore, sources said. His wife, Lesly, is from Maryland. Sajak, a family man, is a hockey and baseball fan.
He is one of a few individuals to lease a suite at the Staples Center. About 100 suites have been leased so far, mostly to business entities.
Each suite will have a refrigerator, wet bar and entertainment center with a wide-screen digital TV and two other monitors so satellite feeds of other NHL and NBA games or different angles of the game in progress can be viewed.
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CHRISTOPHER McDONALD, who plays the philandering husband of Kirstie Alley’s Veronica in the NBC sitcom “Veronica’s Closet,” has purchased a lakefront home at Lake Arrowhead for $1.5 million, sources say.
McDonald, in his early 40s, starred as Robin Williams’ nemesis in the remake of “Flubber” (1997) and appeared with Adam Sandler in the movie “Happy Gilmore.” He also played game-show host Jack Barry in Robert Redford’s “Quiz Show” (1990) and Geena Davis’ husband in “Thelma and Louise.” (1991).
McDonald bought a house with a gated motor court, chauffeur’s quarters, two-bedroom staff suite, five family bedrooms and ballroom-size living room. The 6,000-square-foot house was built in the ‘20s and is considered a mountain lodge with its thick beams, pitched ceilings, slate roof and huge fireplaces.
McDonald and his wife, Lupe, have three children. The family also has a home in the L.A. area.
Lynne B. Wilson of Lynne B. Wilson & Associates, Lake Arrowhead, represented both sides of the transaction.
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A four-acre Laurel Canyon property known to many as the late magician HARRY HOUDINI’s estate has come on the market at $1,777,777.77. It has been owned since last July by an antiques dealer from Georgia who set the price based on the idea that seven is a lucky number.
The antiques dealer spent a year clearing the brush from the site of a mansion which burned down in the ‘50s. The owner also restored the walkways, stairs and stonework and has been refurbishing a building that was the chauffeur’s quarters.
Local lore holds that the estate belonged to Houdini, although construction on the 40-room mansion was begun in 1911 and completed in 1924 by R.J. Walker, who owned an L.A. department store.
The earliest owner of record was the Laurel Canyon Land Co., in which Walker held stock, but Houdini also invested in the company when he came to L.A. to act in two movies in 1919, sources say. The magician is also said to have lived in a guest house, destroyed with the mansion in the same fire.
While clearing the property, the current owner found iron gates carved with the names Walker and Houdini and the year 1919, said listing agent Betty Sulkin of DBL Realtors, Beverly Hills. She shares the listing with David Bader and Lou Bernal, in her office.
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A Montecito home owned by the late FRITZ BADER, who trained some of the first Lipizzaner horses in the United States, has been listed at about $1.3 million.
Bader came from Austria to Santa Barbara in 1961 to work for Jules Berman, developer of Lake Arrowhead and Huntington Harbour. Berman owned the El Capitan Ranch near Santa Barbara, where he bred and trained champion horses.
He bought 29 Lipizzaners in Austria to bring to his ranch and hired Bader to train the stallions, made famous by the Spanish Riding School of Vienna.
Bader died a few years ago. His wife, Mary, continued to live in their home until she died earlier this year.
Built in the ‘50s, their three-bedroom, 3,000-square-foot house on an acre with a stable and riding ring is listed with Paul O’Keeffe of Joyce Gibb Realtors, Santa Barbara, and Barbara Koutnik, Coldwell Banker-Jon Douglas Co., Montecito.
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MAUREEN O’BOYLE, a reporter and anchor on the syndicated newsmagazine show “Extra,” has purchased a Los Feliz house for about its $1.3-million asking price, sources say.
The house had been restored by its former owners, J. Patrick Reilly and Jeffrey Rathaus, who buy houses to refurbish and sell. Her 3,300-square-foot home was built in the ‘30s and has four bedrooms, two fireplaces and city views.
Edward Fitz of Nourmand & Associates, Beverly Hills, had the listing, and Sharon Alden, of the same office, represented O’Boyle, other sources said.
