Monday Mid-Morning Mish Mash

1.
According to The Real Deal, outspoken lefty liberal comedian Rosie O'Donnell has finally closed on the $1,970,000 condo at The Platinum building in New York City for which she reportedly signed a contract in September of 2007.

Her new 22nd floor two bedroom pied a terre puts the Broadway luvin' lesbian blogger right in the heart of the bizzy, loud and tourist filled Times Square theater district. Your Mama wonders if she'll be able to see or hear that stoopid gee-tar strumming cowboy that hangs around Times Square in his underwear entertaining tourists who think he's strange and eccentric.

Several years back Miz O'Donnell and her life sharing ladee-mate Kelli purchased a river front spread in Nyack, NY where they're raising a passel of shorties. Miz O'Donnell also reportedly owns a 1 bedroom condo at the Lumiere building on West 53rd Street (also in New York City) and as far as we can tell, she still owns a waterfront spread on the guard gated and celebrity swamped Star Island enclave in Miami.

2.
Thanks Danny Digsitup from Down Under, we've learned that hard hitting and much maligned Aussie tennis titan Lleyton Hewitt, who in 2006 was nominated by GQ magazine as one of the "10 Most Hated Athletes" in sports–has put his glass and concrete contemporary casa in Adelaide's fancy schmancy Island Point at West Lakes up for sale for an undisclosed asking price.

According to recent article in the Herald Sun, the notoriously mouthy Mister Hewitt forked over $3,200,000–that's $2,160,320 US at today's rates–in 2003 for the 5 bedroom and 4 bathroom waterfront retreat.

Listing information reveals that the 2 story residence measures in at approximately 700 square meters–that's just over 7,500 square feet for us Americans–and includes such dee-luxe amenities as an indoor swimming pool and spa, sauna, private screening room, a billiards room with a sports bar (which we presume means there are several tee-vees suspended above the bar), a lakeside bar, an indoor barbecue, radiant heating, a commercial cool room (whatever that is) and a moss and rock waterfall beside the suspended staircase.

According to Mister Hewitt The Elder, young Mister Hewitt and his with-child wifey don't spend enough time enjoying the lavish comforts of the house to justify owning and maintaining such a residence.

3.
The Times Online is now reporting that the garish, glitzy and grotesquely gaudy Toprak Mansion on The Bishops Avenue in North London, purchased in a blaze of publicity earlier this year for a rumored and reported £50,000,000, was purchased secretly by a gentleman named Nursultan Nazarbayev, who happens to be the current president of Kazakhstan.

The owners of record for the 28,000 square foot quasi-neo-classical hot mess, Hossein Ghandehari and his 75 year old billionaire mother Hourieh Peremam, denied the veracity of the claim which was made by Kazahkstan's former head of security Alnur Musayev.

4.
We hear from the Nashville Newsmonger that country crooner Toby Keith has already karate chopped the asking price of his recently listed mausoleum-like Nashville pied a terre from $1,595,000 to $1,349,000. That was fast.

5.
Another one of those orange skinned Orange County Housewives is selling her house. Well, sort of. Last year, according to property records, Vicki Gunvalson, the uber intense and tightly wound insurance broker, forked over $1,650,000 to purchase an approximately 4,000 square foot house on Altimira in the guard gated community of Coto de Caza. On several episodes of The Real Housewives of Orange County, Vicki and her empty nesting huzband Donn started they wanted to move because their current house (also behind the gates in Coto) was a bit big at approximately 5,000 square feet.

After closing on the new property fickle Miss Vicki decided she wasn't ready to leave the big house where she raised her children. In November of 2007, after having a big queen from San Francisco "decorate" the newly purchased custom built tract house, Mister and Missus Gunvalson hoisted the 5 bedroom and 5 bathroom residence back on the market with an asking price of $1,780,000. Naturally the house was listed with real estate "Housewife" Jeana Keough.

The house did not sell and was later taken off the market only to reappear recently with a new and only slightly improved asking price of $1,695,000, a figure that means that if Jeana can get full price for the house and hard bargaining biznesswoman Vicki can persuade Jeana to cut her commission, she just might break even. However, given the rather sorry state of real estate in Coto de Caza, that looks to be a difficult if not impossible prospect.

6.
Over the weekend, Your Mama traded several covert communiques with a luvlee ladee we'll call Linda Likestotalk who gave us the lowdown one of the many Los Angeles properties for which Jenufleck–or whatever it is that the gossip glossies call Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck–(allegedly) signed a sales contract and then bailed out.

The house in question is the house on Brentwood's N. Carmelina Avenue that the with child couple is often photographed going in and out of. Here, in short summary, is what Miss Likestotalk told Your Mama: The residentially indecisive couple were in contract to purchase the property (which was not been on the open market) for $16,500,000 but, according to Miz Likestotalk, backed out due to concerns that the high priced property could not be "paparazzi proofed."

Strangely, and for reasons about which we do not have a clue, the comely couple continue to visit the newly constructed residence even though, according to Miss Likestotalk, they long ago backed out of the contract. Since Benger (or whatever they're called) backed out, several other parties–including, we hear, filmmaker Judd Apaptow–have expressed interest but not moved forward with a purchase prompting the owner/developer to recently put the 5 bedroom (plus two more in the pool house) and 8 bathroom residence on the open market with an asking price of $14,950,000.

Maybe Afflegar (or whatever) will like the house better at this price.

7.
In May of 2008, the wildly famous and much lauded Richard Neutra designed Kaufmann House in Palm Springs was was sold for a reported $19,000,000 (some earlier reports said $16,840,000) to an undisclosed buyer as part of Christie's Postwar and Contemporary Art auction. However, the big deal fell apart for reasons not released to the public and entirely unknown to Your Mama.

The architecturally significant property on West Vista Chino isnow being offered on the open market with a bargain basement sounding asking price of $12,900,000. But according to Architecutural Record, since being re-listed on September 29, no serious buyers have presented themselves to the Los Angeles real estate company who holds the listing.

Looks like the current owners, a reportedly dee-vorcing couple named Harris, couldn't have timed the sale of their architectural labor of love any worse. Oh dear.