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‘Thieves’ Star Steals Away

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

John Stamos, who stars on the new ABC series “Thieves,” and his wife, actress-model Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, have sold their home on five acres in the mountains of Malibu for close to its $2.25-million asking price.

The couple moved to a 20-acre ranch in the L.A. area that they purchased several months ago. They already refurbished an old house on the ranch that they plan to use for guests once they have built their dream home on the property. There are more than 500 oak trees on the ranch.

Stamos built the house that was just sold. He hired an architect and oversaw construction of the Mediterranean-style home about 10 years ago. He and his wife were married in 1998.

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The home they sold, to a Beverly Hills businessman and his wife, has five bedrooms in 7,800-plus square feet. The property also has a guest house, sound studio, gym, office, pool, spa with a waterfall and caves, outdoor fountain, three-car garage and room to park 40 cars.

Stamos, 38, starred as Uncle Jesse on the ABC sitcom “Full House” from 1987 to 1995. He made his Broadway debut in 1995, replacing Matthew Broderick in the revival of “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.” Stamos also is a producer of “Thieves,” which airs on Friday nights.

Romijn-Stamos, 29, is a former host of MTV’s “House of Style.” She stars with Antonio Banderas in the upcoming Brian DePalma movie “Femme Fatale,” which finished shooting in June. Romijn-Stamos also models for Liz Claiborne.

Carol Huston at Hilton & Hyland, Beverly Hills, represented Stamos and Romijn-Stamos in their sale.

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L.A. Clippers center Sean Rooks has purchased a townhouse in Manhattan Beach for about $500,000. Rooks, 32, bought the unit as a second home to be closer to practice and have a beach retreat for his family.

The townhouse, which is behind gates, has two bedrooms and a loft.

Rooks, 32, has been with the Clippers since June 2000. He started his professional basketball career with the Dallas Mavericks in 1992, then was signed as a free agent by the Lakers in 1996. He returned to Dallas in 1999 before being traded to the Clippers.

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Jordan Cohen of Re/Max Olson Estate Brokerage, Westlake Village, represented Rooks in his purchase, sources said.

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Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and best-selling author Susan Faludi, who became a leading feminist voice when she wrote “Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women” in 1991, has sold her Beachwood Canyon home of 10 years for nearly its $750,000 asking price. She is moving out of the area.

The Cape Cod-style home, set in trees on a lane with views from downtown to the ocean, has three bedrooms in slightly more than 2,000 square feet. Built in 1948, the house also has a master suite with a fireplace, art walls and French doors leading to sun decks.

Faludi, in her early 40s, won a Pulitzer for labor reporting at the Wall Street Journal in 1991. The same year, she won the National Book Critics Circle Award for “Backlash.” In 1999, she examined the other side of the debate on the war between the sexes in “Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man.”

Chris Laib of Prudential John Aaroe, Los Feliz, and Randy Marcus, of the firm’s Brentwood office, had the listing; Ann Fitzgibbon of Coldwell Banker, Hancock Park, represented the buyer.

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Sandra Gooch, founder of the pioneering natural-food market chain Mrs. Gooch’s (now owned by Whole Foods Markets), and her husband, Harry Lederman, have sold their home in the guard-gated Beverly Hills-area community of Mulholland Estates for $4.9 million.

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The couple built the home in 1998. It was not officially on the market.

The home, on nearly an acre, has six bedrooms in about 9,000 square feet.

It also has a media room, library, office with a separate entrance; step-down living room; kitchen with two center islands and a breakfast room; a master suite with a fireplace, spa tub, steam shower and wet bar; a wine cellar, butler’s pantry, family room with wet bar, two staircases, an elevator, a pool, spa, grassy yard and courtyard with a fountain.

The granite, limestone and wood house also has hillside and valley views.

Gooch, in her 60s, sold her company and its seven L.A. stores to Whole Foods Market in 1993. At the time, the firms were the nation’s two biggest natural-food supermarket chains.

Judy Cycon and Joe Babajian of Prudential John Aaroe, Beverly Hills, represented the sellers, and Valerie Fitzgerald of Coldwell Banker, Beverly Hills North, represented the buyer, sources said.

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British director Stephen Hopkins has listed his Los Feliz home at just under $1.3 million.

Hopkins, who has directed such movies as “Lost in Space” (1998) and “Blown Away” (1994), bought a place in New York last summer and plans to buy a pied-a-terre at a Southern California beach.

Built in 1923 by artist Francis William Vreeland as his home and studio, the Craftsman-style house that Hopkins is selling has four bedrooms and three baths plus a den in about 3,700 square feet.

The living room with two-story windows was used as Vreeland’s studio. The artist, who died at 75 in 1954, used redwood and heavy timbers in the design.

Hopkins bought the house about four years ago, soon after it was updated while maintaining the Craftsman look.

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Richard Stanley of Coldwell Banker, Los Feliz, has the listing.

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Music manager Pat Magnarella, who has guided the careers of such groups as the Goo Goo Dolls, and his wife, Christine, have put their architecturally interesting house in the Hollywood Hills on the market at $745,000.

Designed by architects Craig Hodgetts and Hsin-Ming Fung, the three-bedroom, nearly 3,000-square-foot house that the Magnarellas are selling was built in 1990, but the architects came back recently to fine-tune their original design emphasizing color and theatricality.

The kitchen was built of concrete and stainless steel, and it has cherry wood surfaces. There are also such intriguing spaces as a passageway that is a gym.

Pat Magnarella is a principal of Mosaic Media Group and a partner at Atlas Third Rail Management. He was executive producer of the “City of Angels” soundtrack album, which yielded No. 1 singles for Third Rail artists Alanis Morissette and the Goo Goo Dolls as well as a No. 1 single by Sarah McLachlan.

Barry Sloane at Sotheby’s, Beverly Hills, has the listing.

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Want to see previous columns on celebrity realty transactions? Visit www.latimes.com/hotproperty for more Hot Properties.

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