Neighbors at Legal War Over Rihanna's Big Move

Here's another recent story from TMZ on singing superstar Rihanna. Rihanna previously rented a house in the Hollywood Hills that she allegedly considered buying.  She eventually moved out after an angry neighbor sued her for trampling his property.  Now her former landlord is reportedly suing the angry neighbor for killing the sale.

More details here: Neighbors at Legal War Over Rihanna's Big Move

Lamar Odom's House -- Now with Furniture!

TMZ recently reported that Lamar Odom is so anxious to sell his Manhattan Beach, California home that he just paid to have it staged.  We don't think this information is particularly newsworthy--except to note that the house doesn't look any better than it did before.

Go see for yourself:  Lamar Odom's House -- Now with Furniture!

Tiger Woods: Car Trouble in Paradise?

By now you've heard that golf phenom Tiger Woods was involved in a single-vehicle car accident at 2:25am on Friday right in front of his house.  He was knocked unconscious for a couple of minutes.  The neighbor called 911.  And Tiger's wife, Erin (shown with him above), used a golf club to break the car window. 

Rumors started flying everywhere!  After all, where was Tiger going at that late hour?  Why hasn't he talked to the police?  Did he and Erin have a fight?  Did she use the golf club because she was angry?  Is Tiger having an affair?  Why did he issue a statement saying that "the situation" was all his fault and promise that it won't happen again?  How can anyone promise a car accident won't happen again--unless he's not really talking about the car accident? 

And, finally, what's the scoop on his house?  There are lots of photos out there purported to show his home.  But which one is really his?

Well, we can at least help clear up the last matter!  Tiger lives with his wife and two kids in a luxury lake home in Isleworth, a private gated community in the Orlando suburb of Windermere, Florida.

After the accident, there were lots of stories showing this house as belonging to him:

The problem is, this house is not on a lake.  It's actually on a beach!  In Hawaii!  And it's not Tiger's house!

Here's another one that is more commonly shown in connection with Tiger's accident story:

Well at least it's close -- very close in fact -- but it's not Tiger's house either!  It's actually right next door!

HERE is Tiger's house:

We'll let you know if we dig up photos of the interior!

Happy Cyber Monday!

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday!  As you probably figured out by now, we took the entire week off last week.  Next time, we'll try to give you a little notice beforehand.  Now, let's spend the day shopping online and catching up on news stories about celebrity homes! 

Up first:  Tiger Woods!

Nelson Peltz Palm Beach Mansion

Situated on North County Road in Palm Beach, the Nelson Peltz property, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean and just north of the famed Breakers Hotel, features a French Regency-style, 44,000-square-foot main residence. The 13-acre property also has a 16,000-square-foot guesthouse, two swimming pools, a tennis court and a movie theater. Peltz, who is a member of The Forbes Four Hundred Richest in America list, is chief executive of New York holding company Triarc Companies (arbys, wendys). He is trying to sell the property because he doesn't use it anymore. Ned Monell of Sotheby's International Realty has the listing. Nelson Peltz is the former owner of Snapple. His current net worth is estimated at $1.05 billion, and he lives in an oceanfront mansion in Palm Beach.

Richard Gere Sells His Hamptons Home for $5.9M

Speaking of the Hamptons . . . Forever handsome Richard Gere and his lovely wife, actress Carey Lowell, recently sold their home in the Hamptons for $5.9 million.  According to the Wall Street Journal, the new owner paid about a third less than the asking price.  Fortunately for us, the WSJ has a slideshow allowing us to peek inside this 7BR home, which sits on 1.2 acres in Water Mill, NY.

The approaching winter clearly has us obsessed with fireplaces right now.  We hated the one in Russell and Kimora Lee Simmons' NJ estate.  But we loved the fireplaces in Barefoot Contessa/Ina Garten and Jason Winer's homes.  And we love the one in this bedroom below:

Okay, so it's not glamorous, but it has a rustic country feel that we like.

Likewise for the kitchen above and dining room below.

Mismatched chairs always make us feel like we can relax. This looks like a perfect spot for Thanksgiving dinner--something else that's also on our minds lately!

Tell us what you think.  Would you prefer an informal dining room like Richard and Carey's or a more formal dining room for Thanksgiving?

Top photo from The Insider.  House photos from Saunders Associates.

The Barefoot Contessa's Barn

With Thankgiving only one week away, our thoughts are naturally turning to cooking and entertaining.  We've always loved the Barefoot Contessa cookbooks by Ina Garten, who also has her own show of the same name on the Food Network.  She has a beautiful home in East Hampton and recently built a barn(!) for entertaining her friends.

Ina's barn houses a large multi-purpose room with a wonderful open kitchen and dining area.  The visible rafters give it that barn-like feel, yet it is still so remarkably cozy!  We think the fireplace (top photo) makes a huge difference.   We also like that she included comfy arm chairs at the dining table so that it can double as a reading space.

The barn also serves as a guest house, with a beautifully simple approach to decor.  We love the mottled mirror over the sofa in the entry.  The objects located across from it make it appear as if it is a painting.

The bedroom and bath are likewise peaceful and simple:

Can you believe all of this is inside this inconspicuous looking building below?!!!

We love it!  If you want to see more barn photos, check out the House Beautiful slideshow. 

Also, the folks at House Beautiful liked Ina's barn so much, they asked her to recreate it in Rockefeller Plaza and named it their 2009 Kitchen of the Year.  Check out the video here:

We love it too!

VIDEO: Forbes on Celebrity Real Estate Woes

Here's something we ran across on Twitter:  a Forbes video discussing how celebrities aren't immune from the problems in the real estate market.  It offers glimses inside the homes of Nicholas Cage, Ellen DeGeneres, Eddie Murphy, and other celebs who have had to slash sales prices drastically.  The video also mentions LaToya Jackson, Stephen Baldwin, Toni Braxton and other celebs facing foreclosure.

We posted or tweeted many of these stories over the past several months.  In fact, we tweet LOTS of stories when we don't have time to write about them ourselves.  So if you want to read about more celebrity homes than those you see here, please FOLLOW US ON TWITTER:  @CelebrityDigsHQ.

In the meantime, watch the video and tell us what you think!  Are you sympathetic?  After all, celebs are human just like us.  Or, do you think these celebs tried to live too lavishly?

For Sale: TV Executive Producer Jason Winer's Hollywood Loft

As seen in our post on Sigrid Olsen, you can have a fabulous lifestyle without living in a mansion.  Take this home, which belongs to Jason Winer, executive producer of ABC's hilarious new TV show Modern Family (starring our favorite Married With Children Alum, Ed O'Neill a/k/a Al Bundy).  It's a charming little 2BR loft that looks large, but really isn't.  And it's for sale!

The 3-story condo/townhouse/loft is part of an 8-unit property built by Paramount in the 1920's as a bungalow for their writers.  So you have a chance to own a little slice of Hollywood history.  The asking price is $599,000.

Now, some of the rooms are a little tiny--like the kitchen and dining room above, and the bedroom below:

But that's part of the charm!  The creative types always seem to find their genius in small spaces like this.  Remember, Twitter co-founder Biz Stone's bungalow in Berkeley?

Plus, the 18ft ceilings in the living room and the airy loft upstairs offer breathing room and make up for the lack of space in other rooms.  We love it!

All photos from Sotheby's International Realty.  For more information and to see more photos, check out the listing here.

Mystery Monday: Which Rock Star Calls This L.A. Pad Home?

We bet you're wondering who lives in this well-curated apartment with fabulous views of the City of Angels.  We'll give you a hint:  It's a famous musician known for his flamboyance.  Okay, maybe that doesn't narrow things down much! 

MAKE THE JUMP BELOW TO FIND OUT WHO AND SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THIS HOME
This British-born rock star has been in the game for 40 years!

Yes, it's Sir Elton John!  That's him above, standing near the entrance of his Los Angeles apartment he shares with his partner, filmmaker David Furnish (seated).  They are pictured in front of an artwork by renowned British artist Damien Hirst.

It is clear that art is the focus in this home.  Each piece carries some provenance or another, from the furniture to the bric-a-brac--which includes Dale Chiluly and vintage Murano glass scuptures. 

While we love a lot of what we see, we are reminded of Kanye West's home.  Kanye's home was similarly curated with some of the finest modern works of art and furniture we've ever seen, but seemed cold and empty.

Granted, we like Elton's place a little better because it offers spectacular views and glimpses of Elton's personality.  There are over-the-top design elements--like the Tracey Emin neon sign and the stamped python leather bed--that harken back to the time when his wardrobe included ostrich feathers and light-studded glasses.  Yet, it is surprisingly (Dare we say it?) tasteful.

All photos by Tim Street-Porter for Architectural Digest.  To see a slideshow with more photos, go here.

Celebrity Home of the Week: Donna Karan's Island Retreat

After yesterday's post about a famous hip-hop mogul's home, we figured we'd give you something nice to look at today.  Fortunately, the latest issue of Architectural Digest (December 2009) offers plenty of choices. We just got ours in the mail this week and we were delighted to see that the entire issue is devoted to celebrity homes. And we loved almost every home we saw!

We especially loved the British West Indies family retreat of celebrated fashion designer Donna Karan (shown above on the left, with her daughter Gabrielle).  It's earthy and gorgeous!

SEE MORE PHOTOS OF THIS RETREAT AFTER THE JUMP BELOW
Donna's family retreat consists of a series of pavilions -- including separate guest, spa and yoga pavilions-- ranging from 4,000 to 7,000 square feet each.  All are located on Parrot Cay in the Turks and Caicos Islands.  It reminds us of film-maker Rob Cohen's Bali retreat.

The main house pavillion (top photo and below) is casually open, with ocean views and numerous spots for lounging.

In contrast, the guesthouse living room, filled with beautiful African Art, looks wonderfully secluded:

And imagine waking up bathed in the morning sunlight in this master bedroom in the spa pavilion:

 We would never leave!  That's why, it's our Celebrity Home of the Week!  Ciao!

To see more of this fabulous home and read the story of how it came to exist, go here.  Photos by Durston Saylor.

Winning Bidder Pays $35,000 to Tour Bill Gates' House

Todd Bishop, a blogger for Seattle-based TechFlash.com, recently reported that Bill Gates donated a tour of his Lake Washington home once again this year for a charity event.  He's talking about this techie-lover's dream home, we featured a while back. 

Anyway, last year, the winning bid was $8,600.  This year, it came in at a whopping $35,000!   Either the economy is really bouncing back, or somebody has waaayyy too much money on their hands.  Hey, may we tag along?

A big thanks to Zillow Blog for spotting this news item.

Can You Guess Who Owns This House?

This living room is filled with tons of furniture, drapes, and accessories.  In fact, the whole house is filled with so much opulence that it's hard to believe anyone can even breathe here.  So whose house is it?

FLIP THE HOOD BELOW TO FIND OUT & SEE MORE PHOTOS!

This is the 35,000 square foot New Jersey "home" that Kimora Lee Simmons shared with her now ex-husband hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons:

We reported on Tuesday that this home was for sale and that we'd seen it before.  All of these photos were taken a couple of years ago, when the home was first put up for sale.  They were asking $23 million then.

We wonder if the furnishings come with the current asking price of $16.5 million.  Don't know if anyone would want all this ornate stuff anyway.  Like, if you thought the living room was too much, check out the dining room:

And though we're unsure what they used their self-described "Lion room" for, we're sure that we're frightened by its fireplace:

It's clear they spared no expense.   The home not only comes with its own movie theater . . .

. . . it even has a ticket counter with a creepy anamatronic ticket-taker:

Nevertheless, there are a few enviable touches like this indoor pool in their spa room:

If you want to see more opulence, go here.  All photos by Matthew Roberts for the NY Daily News.

Where Can I find the Mansions in Palm Beach Florida

Well, we are hearing this question pretty frequently" "Where Can I find the Mansions in Palm Beach Florida?"

If you are visiting West Palm Beach or Palm Beach anytime soon, you may be asking yourself, "Where can I find the wealthy home area?" Well, the answer is pretty easy. To overly simplify this, the million dollar homes in this area of Florida are along A1A (also known as Ocean Ave). Though they can be hard to find given the gates and massive landscaping (including Royal Palms that are over a hundred years old and huge ficus hedges).

Many million dollar homes are located on South Ocean Boulevard in Palm Beach Florida. This street has many famous homes to include the Mar-a-Lago Club that is owned by Donald Trump. (answering another popular question: where is Donald Trumps Marlago mansion?" This strip has several huge Florida Mansions, including a couple valued at over $50,000,000. Many of these homes along A1a in West Palm Beach, Manalapan and Ocean Ridge have cabanas on the ocean side that match their house, connected by tunnels to the main homes, where the backyards are the intercoastal! It's an exciting drive to pass these million dollar homes in Palm Beach County. If you pass this area at night and on a weekend, you may catch a glimpse of a celebrity in one of the nearby restaurants just located off of South Ocean Boulevard. Local celebrities in Palm Beach County include Chris Evert Loyd, Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, Celine Dion, Rush Limbaugh, and many others.

If you want to walk around some of the lower million dollar homes, then there is metered parking around a mile from the Mara-a-Lago Club. It's extremely hard to get one of these metered parking spots if you are arriving before 6:00 P.M. It is a lot easier to find parking after 6:00 P.M, when the sun has gone down and the beach goers are finished swimming and surfing. This community is perhaps one of the most luxurious in the United States of America. Many world famous millionaires live in this area and security is extremely tight. If you are looking to shop around this area, be sure to bring plenty of cash since the restaurants and shops are a bit pricey.

Kimora Lee Simmons looks to trade $16.5M New Jersey estate for new Manhattan pad

Will she ever unload this house?  We saw Kimora's mansion on MTV Cribs a while back, when she was still married to Russell Simmons.  We hated almost ever inch of this house.  We'll dig up some photos later and show you why.  In the meantime, read the full story here:

Kimora Lee Simmons looks to trade $16.5M New Jersey estate for new Manhattan pad | The Real Deal | New York Real Estate News

Website Listing Addresses and Aerial Photos of Celebrity Homes Comes Under Scrutiny

The L.A. Times reports today that one our favorite sources -- Celebrity Aerial Address -- is currently under scrutiny in connection with a criminal investigation. A search warrant revealed that one of the alleged Hollywood Hills burglars used the site to obtain the addresses of celebrities, including Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, and Orlando Bloom.

Some people may not realize that the addresses of celebrities' homes are public information.  It just take a little bit of legwork to find it.  Or you can visit CelebrityAerialAddress.com.  The site's operator, David Ruppel a.k.a. Celebrity Dave, gathers publicly available data on celebrities' homes into a one-stop shopping site and charges a fee for the service. 

We use Dave's service occasionally.  (So do a lot of other celebrity real estate bloggers!) We try to avoid publishing the addresses of celebrities, however.  We believe our readers typically don't care about where celebrities live.  They're just curious about how celebrities live.

Tell us, do you think there's anything wrong with having access to celebrities' addresses?

Metropolitan Home Magazine Folds

Hachette Filipacchi Media, publisher of Elle Decor and other notable magazines, announced today that it will halt publication of Metropolitan Home magazine.  December 2009 will be its last issue.  Another one bites the dust.  Too bad.  Met Home was one of our favorite sources for info on celebrity homes.

Thanks to Casa Sugar and Shelteriffic for alerting everyone.

Mad Men's John Slattery Says "Not In My Backyard!"

We Tivo'd last night's season finale of Mad Men and started watching it this morning.  We were on the edge of our bed waiting to hear a final quip from our favorite character, Roger Sterling.  But, as luck would have it, our Tivo ran out of storage space and didn't record the last few minutes!  Oh well!

We decided to spend this morning looking for info about the homes of Roger, er, John Slattery, that is (above). We know this handsome actor is married to actress Talia Balsam--who plays his ex-wife on the show and also happens to be the real-life ex-wife of George Clooney.  We also know that they split their time between New York and Los Angeles.

Looks like they might be spending more time in New York . . . so they can keep fighting!  No, not each other!  They are fighting the city's plans to build a $346 million sanitation department building in their neighborhood.  For more details, check out the Huffington Post article here.

We'll let you know if we find photos.  In the meantime, if you want to get your fix on the homes of Mad Men stars, be sure to read our earlier posts showcasing the homes of John Hamm/Don Draper, January Jones/Betty Draper, and  Bryan Batt/Sal Romano.  By the way, Sal was conspicuously absent from last night's show, but we'd bet money he'll be back!

Celebrity Home of the Week: Sigrid Olsen's Home

Sorry for the late posting.  Today is such a terrible news day. One day after the mass shooting at Fort Hood, we now have another mass shooting, this time in Orlando. It's the kind of day to make us question why we do what we do.

FIND OUT WHO THIS WOMAN IS and SEE WHY HER HOME INSPIRES US>>

In searching for something to put it all in perspective, we ran across a slideshow from the New York Times about the home of well-known fashion designer Sigrid Olsen.  Until last year, Sigrid designed clothes under her own label for Liz Claiborne.  She has since traded in her spacious home for a tiny bungalow in the Rocky Neck art colony of Gloucaster, MA.

What you don't learn from the slideshow is that Sigrid battled breast cancer a few years ago, which ultimately led her to back to her earlier love of painting. 

She now sells her artwork from her 1,200 square foot bungalow, which houses her combined living, work, and gallery spaces.  The dining room table (above) serves as her work space and her husband (below)manages the gallery from the living room. 

The garage provides additional studio space for Sigrid as well as her 90-year old father (below), who is also a painter.

In short, we are inspired by Sigrid and we love her home.  It is our Celebrity Home of the Week. 

The recent shootings remind us how fragile life can be.  We believe the choices we make about where to live and how to live should reinforce what is really important to us.  In Sigrid's case, it isn't a spacious mansion or a lot of high end furniture that brings her joy.  It's a small home in a lovely little community where she can pursue her passion for art and spend time with her family.

So, to answer our own question:  We examine the homes of celebrities to find inspiration and at the same time learn more about what's important to them and ourselves. 

Tell us, does your home inspire you?  Does it reinforce what is really important to you?

Photos by Jodi Hilton for the NY Times.  To learn more about Sigrid's Art, visit http://www.sigridolsenart.com/.

First Lady of France Carla Bruni's Childhood Castle For Sale

Carla Bruni has many titles: wife of French President Nicholas Sarkozy, former singer/songwriter, former model, and current fashion icon who gave our First Lady Michelle Obama (shown with Bruni above) a run for her money at this year's G-20 summit.

Well she's also an Italian-born heiress who grew up in this castle in Italy, which happens to be for sale with an asking price of around $28 million (U.S. dollars):

It's grand of course! Still don't know if we'd ever want to live in a castle, though. See interior and exterior photos at PropGoLuxury. Hat tip to Luxuo for alerting us to it!

After checking out the photos, let us know if you'd want to live there!

Poppy Montgomery's Spanish Colonial Home

When we featured Enrique Murciano yesterday, we did not realize that CBS had just canceled his show, Without A Trace.  That's too bad.  Oh well, since we're already focused on that show, we figured we might as well take a look at the home of his co-star, Australian-born Poppy Montgomery.  And, as with Enrique's home, we were again pleasantly surprised!

SEE MORE PHOTOS AFTER THE JUMP>>

Poppy lives in a charming renovated 1920's Spanish Colonial in California's Pacific Palisades area.  After looking at her living room (top photo) and her master bedroom (below), we can see that she has a lot of style.

We especially like the open feel of her master bath, with doors to the outside:

Did you notice that the ottoman matches that gorgeous tile surrounding the sink on the left?  Or how the shower on the right beckons you, even though it's covered in dark tile? 

To see more photos of Poppy's home, go here.  Be sure to come back and tell us what you think!

All photos by Joe Shmeltzer for PointClickHome.