Sad money puppet Paris Hilton has purchased an East London building that once housed a brothel frequented by horny sailors. It's an odd investment for the Beverly Hills chihuahua, but even odder is that, for some reason, she's convinced her new building used to be a pirate dungeon:
It’s just beautiful. It doesn’t have regular rooms but is more like a maze. It used to be an opium den and still has iron joists where pirates and thieves were shackled to the wall.
Somewhere in London, a real estate agent is cackling all the way to the bank.
Two months ago, hoggish kingpin Donald Trump vowed to save kindly old Ed McMahon, whose Beverly Hills home was in danger of foreclosure. Trump said he was going to buy McMahon's place and lease it back to the aging TV personality at a reasonable price. We told you then that the move was prompted by nothing more than Trump's craving for easy publicity, but we had no idea how low Trump was willing to go to get his sullied name in print.
Heyoooooooooooooo, Ed's been abandoned!
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WHO WANTS TO LIVE IN A CRAZY HOUSE? "The Beverly Hills home where Britney Spears suffered so much drama, including getting hauled off to the hospital back in January, is now on the market for $7.9 million."
CLEARING HOUSE, INDEED "Ed McMahon, who for decades appeared as Johnny Carson's sidekick on The Tonight Show, is fighting to avoid foreclosure on his multimillion-dollar Beverly Hills home, according to published reports. The former Star Search host was $644,000 behind on payments on $4.8 million in mortgage loans when a unit of Countrywide Financial Corp. filed a default notice Feb. 28 with the Los Angeles County Recorder's Office … McMahon, 85, has been a pitchman for the American Family Publishers' sweepstakes. However, he has been unable to work as a pitchman for various products since he broke his neck 18 months ago …"
After a few months spent hiding from the prostitution scandal that toppled his career, Eliot Spitzer, the beady-eyed, deposed governor of New York, has again secured gainful employment. Though his new position carries slightly less prestige than head of one of the greatest states in America. Spitzer's working at his daddy's real estate company.
Spitzer Enterprises, the real estate business Bernie Spitzer, started decades ago, is a multimillion-dollar New York City empire, so there's plenty of dough to pay for Eliot's services. The problem is defining what Eliot's services are exactly: "What I hear from my sources is that he walks around and makes suggestions, or discusses ideas. I don’t think anyone knows if any of these ideas will work," an insider told the Observer.
Surprisingly, nobody seems to think it a bad idea to let Eliot around all these tall buildings.
Oh, the irony:
Which wife of a major real estate developer hired a private eye to confirm her husband is gay? Surprise! The investigator discovered the hubby was actually a regular customer of a female escort service.
We don't know by name many real estate developers, but we really, really, really hope it's the one we're thinking of.
DOH!(ERTY) "[Pete Doherty] is thousands of pounds in debt. Now he has been evicted from his sprawling nine-bedroom mansion after wrecking the place over the past year. Popping over to check on the place the landlord was horrified to find that his beautiful country pad had become a stinking hovel. The walls, floor and even some of the windows have been daubed with human blood. And we're told the stench from his abandoned nine cats is so strong it would turn the strongest stomach. After taking one look at the carnage, the landlord cancelled Doherty's tenancy."
To where does years of drug abuse lead you, kids? To being out on your ass in a state of paranoia, that's where.
Gary Busey, longtime friend of fine Colombian cocaine, has been evicted from his Malibu home after months of failing to pay rent. Busey's landlord claims Busey owes him 50 grand, but Busey says he was simply withholding the tens of thousands of dollars until his "unclean air conditioning vents" were sanitized. Guess with whom the law sides?
If you've got a spare bed and don't mind sharing bumps, you've got a friend in need in Malibu.
We've attached a video under here of some of Busey's greatest hits. We're assuming the breathtaking ocean view in the clip is the one the now homeless Busey will be missing in a couple weeks.
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Rich people have problems, too: Moby is trying to sell his four-story El Dorado penthouse in Manhattan's Central Park West neighborhood, but nobody's willing to fork over the $7.5 million needed to buy it. We know what you're thinking: "Poor Moby. I wish I could help him." Well, you're in luck.
On Friday, Moby emailed his friends with this teaser: 'If you find someone to buy the apartment I'll happily give $75,000 to you or your favorite charity.' When we contacted him, he agreed to extend the same offer to MainStreet readers.
Sounds great in theory, but nobody who desperately needs that $75,000 runs around with the millionaires rich enough to buy that stupid apartment. But we're praying for you Moby, because heaven forbid you have to lower the asking price.
[Source]
Gayle King, Oprah Winfrey's BFF, just purchased a $7.1 million New York penthouse under the name of Winfrey's recently deceased dog, Sophie.
…a company called Sophie's Penthouse LLC bought [the apartment]. It has three bedrooms, 31/2 baths, a large living room/dining area, and a 768-square-foot wraparound terrace.
It makes sense for King's new home to be dedicated to Sophie, as the pet was very much like King in her reliance on Oprah for spoils and splendor.
Wanna see a shrine to depression but without any of the white guilt that ruins the Indian reservations? You're in luck, paleface!
The Los Angeles City Council is voting next week on whether or not the crumbling stucco bungalow where Charles Bukowski once lived should be preserved as a landmark. Though currently boarded up, proponents of making a monument out of the 90-year-old property where Chuck drank countless pints of swill and wrote his first novel want it to become part of a walking tour of LA.
If the motion passes, people from around the world will be able to see what sort of environment contributes to a man's persistent drunkenness and relentless pursuit to hurt women.
• You will? [Jossip]
• Lindsay Lohan's breasts as art? [DListed]
• Javier Bardem doesn't seem too excited about his impending Oscar. [PS]
• What does Hilary Duff do these days? [HT]
• "A Joker action figure modeled after Heath Ledger’s character in The Dark Knight is going to be released. There are two versions…one with a rocket launcher and another with a knife." [INO]
• How can a premiere happen so many times? [ICYDK]
• Here are some homes much too large for the people inhabiting them. Suck it, homeless situation. [CityRag]
Rumor has it Ellen Pompeo and Cameron Diaz are fighting over a $5.5 million Chelsea apartment. Really? Nobody else was available to get in on the bidding war? We hope there's not an all-out brawl for the apartment; not that it wouldn't be entertaining, but Cam could snap all of Ellen's bones in three seconds. And then who would annoyingly lust after McDreamy every Thursday night?
We have an easy solution as to who should get the apartment, which has four bedrooms, four baths and six private terraces: Give it to us. And then the two of you can move to another city.
[Source]
Because money is more important to people than not looking calloused, the apartment in which Heath Ledger died is already on the market. (One can't mourn forever, you know, and have you seen the cost of private kindergarten these days?)
The loft is renting for $25,000/month, $3,000/month more than Ledger was paying. Says one broker, "You don't wait around in a hot rental market like this."
Joseph Simmons, the seminal rapper turned reverend and star of reality show Run's House, is selling the very home for which his show is named. The property boasts six bedrooms, five bathrooms and a three car garage, and it's listing price is $5.5 million.
No word yet as to why Run is parting with such splendor. Maybe the reverend has finally taken Matthew 19:24 to heart, which says, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." Then again, maybe not.
Pop jock Madonna has purchased the house next to one of her houses in London for the sole purpose of converting it into a fitness center. Boasting 10 bedrooms, the £6 million ($12 million) home-cum-gym is the most healthful slap in the face London's homeless have ever received.
[Source]
FLUSH IT DOWN There's so much bullshit in the world of fashion it's begun affecting architecture: "Tommy Hilfiger has cashed in on his East Hampton summer home with a more than $8 million profit in just a year and a half…The Corcoran Group brokered the sale of the estate, which boasts five bedrooms, 512 baths…"
The misunderstood, famished Olsen twins are unloading their 5,725-square-foot, West Village condo. Bidding begins at $11.995 million, but qualified buyers can probably get them to knock off about $.055 million.
The twins obtained the property in late 2004 for almost a third less than they are now asking.
According to The Observer, the penthouse has 53 windows; one for every week of the year and one more to piss out of onto the human offal milling below!
Editor
