Carolyn Murphy On The Move...Again: Part 2

Earlier today Your Mama discussed a tastefully put together, boho-sheek Spanish-style house in Los Angeles, CA listed for $2,995,000 and owned by still-posing supermodel Carolyn Murphy who, we repeatedly noted, suffers from a classic and ongoing case of The Celebrity Real Estate Fickle.

Our rudimentary research shows that in addition to the L.A. property she's currently got up for sale, over the last six (or so) years Miz Murphy has owned (at least) four other homes including a two-story contemporary squeezed on to a tight lot in Venice (CA) and a spectacular, swimming pool-free Spanish style in the comparatively staid flats of Brentwood in Los Angeles (CA).

Just before moving to her current crib—the one in Brentwood now up for grabs—Miz Murphy very briefly owned and occupied a 19th century, Greek Revival-style red-brick townhouse on a leafy street just a couple blocks from the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (a.k.a the BQE) in New York City's (mostly) dignified and historic Brooklyn Heights 'hood.

Property records reveal she bought the four-floor, two-unit townhouse in August 2010 for $3,600,000 but quickly succumbed to her incurable case of The Celebrity Real Estate Fickle and sold the property just about nine months later, in June 2011, for $3,920,000.

A quick study of the floor plan included with listing information from the time of the sale, which Your Mama managed to haul up out of the murky deep of the interweb, shows the floor-through garden level apartment has 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom and a couple of (possibly decorative) fireplaces. Depending on what gets counted and/or used as a bedroom, the triplex owner's unit has 4-6 bedrooms and two fairly small but thankfully windowed bathrooms, both somewhat inconveniently located off the stair landings.

Tall pocket doors divide the parlor floor living room, with original floor-to-ceiling windows, a decorative fireplace, and (unpainted) wood floors, from the dining room, with almost identical fireplace and painted wood floors. The kitchen, wedged tightly into a tall and model-thin space behind the dining room, has—or at least had at the time Miz Murphy sold it—Euro-style appliances, open shelving, extra-big farmhouse sink, through-the-wall a/c unit, and a room-wide row of large, six-over-six windows that overlook the back garden. The kitchen looks like it was bought from IKEA but we have no knowledge whatsoever whether it actually was or was not.

Anyhoo, the second and third floors each have two good-sized bedrooms and one squeezer-of-a-bedroom that—in Your Mama's humble and utterly meaningless opinion—might both better be utilized as a home office, dressing room, toy storage closet, meditation lounge, play space and/or what-have-you.

Miz Murphy and her current crib—the one in Brentwood now on the market—were featured in all their tawny and glossy-rustic glory in the March 2012 issue of Vogue. She told the fashion-obsessed peeps at Vogue—we have a copy of it thoughtfully provided by an aide de camp we'll call Rhonda Rainyday—that she left Brooklyn and hightailed it back to Cali because '"having the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway outside my door was too much for me."'

Before briefly alighting in Brooklyn Miz Murphy (and child) spent a few years in a rather dynamite 1907 Craftsman bungalow on a bucolic 3-ish acre estate in Ojai, CA she bought in December 2007 from Wrigley gum heir Paxson "Packy" Offield for $3,500,500.

Our online research turned up an archived listing for the gated estate in Ojai that shows the updated and upgraded bungalow measures around 3,400 square feet and contains 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. A separate guest house offers additional living and slumbering space plus a private pooper.

The large living room has a lots of multi-pane windows, a wood-beamed ceiling and imposing (but still cozy) river rock fireplace. The country kitchen has a yummy walk-in pantry, commercial-style appliances, open shelving for the dishes, butcher block counter tops and an adjoining dining area with river rock walls.

Upstairs the living room-sized master bedroom has a high wood ceiling, hardwood floors, a second imposing (but still cozy) river rock fireplace and an attached, two-chamber bathroom with twin pedestal sinks and a claw footed tub.

We're not sure who is responsible for the day-core of her Ojai house but it all leaned and veered heavily towards a more East Coast Americana than French Provençal. Then again, we don't know a decorative donkey from a goat, so...

Although she did not sell her Ojai estate until September 2010 Miz Murphy was, as usual, bitten by the bug of her incurable case of The Celebrity Real Estate Fickle way back in May 2008, just five months after signing on the deed's dotted line. Between May 2008 and September 2010, according to the fine folks at Redfin, Miz Murphy de- and re-listed the property a number of times at a variety of prices until, according to property records, it finally got snatched up, at a quarter million dollar-plus loss to her, for $3,250,000.

So, she went from Venice to Brentwood to Ojai to Brooklyn, back to Brentwood and now where? Where, oh where shall Miz Murphy next set down some (if history tells us anything, probably temporary) real estate roots? Ironically—or annoyingly, depending on your point of view—Miz Murphy also told the Vogue people (in the March 2012 issue), '"I don't see us staying in Los Angeles...I Don't think it feeds you in the way the East Coast does."' First of all, hunny, pleeze. Secondly, we suggest you beware the chanting hordes of Buddha statue owning Tinseltown New Agers who migrated from the East Coast to rub magic crystals all over their co-dependant inner children while the sun set over the fiery Pacific Ocean. Trust Your Mama when we tell you those people can get ugly when dissed and (probably unintentionally) dissed they were. And, thirdly, does all this soul feeding nonsense mean the model's packing up and moving cross-country, again? Could be. Or not. Who knows?

Heaven's to Betsy, children, this bracingly beautiful beehawtcha moves house so frequently she probably has to keep a moving company on retainer so they're ready the very moment her feet get itchy. But that's really calling the kettle black since Your Mama and The Dr. Cooter have had two apartments, three houses and three offices in the last 10 years. Good grief. When we're not packing or unpacking, we're making plans for our next pack and unpack. But that's another story for another day in another place with an bottomless mid-morning cocktail in hand.

listing photos and floor plan (Brooklyn): Brown Harris Stevens via StreetEasy
listing photos (Ojai): Village Properties via Redfin

Model Carolyn Murphy On The Move....Again: Part 1

SELLER: Carolyn Murphy
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA (Brentwood)
PRICE: $2,995,000
SIZE: 2,361 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Your Mama regrets to inform the children that still fresh-faced and drop-dead gorgeous 38-year old supermodel Carolyn Murphy has long been stricken with a (seemingly) incurable case of The Celebrity Real Estate Fickle. That's right, puppies, this American-born globetrotter and her impossibly high cheekbones and flawless, perpetually bronzed skin flips pricey properties like a good Morman or an old-school Catholic makes babies, one after another in rapid succession.

In late-November 2006 the still-strutting her stuff 5-foot-9-inch blond single mother of one—is there a catwalk or a cover she hasn't worked it on?—sold an almost brand-new, two-story contemporary in the hip and trendy but still rough around the edges beach community of Venice CA for $2,375,000. That was, as per property records we peeped, twenty thousand clams less than she paid for the place just 9 short months earlier.

Since she sold up in Venice, the long-time and current face of Estee Lauder has owned at least four other multi-million dollar residences including her current crib, a compassionately remodeled and picture perfect Spanish-style casa in Los Angeles's upscale Brentwood area that she bought in September 2011 for $2,625,000 and—thanks to Rhonda Rainyday we recently learned—put on the market last week with a $2,995,000 price tag.

A few quick and unscientific clicks and clacks of the hard-working beads on Your Mama's bejeweled abacus reveals the opening asking price amounts to a $41,111.11 monthly increase in value over the 9 short months (to date) she's owned the property.

The Los Angeles County Tax Man puts the two-story domicile at a decidedly modest-by-celeb standards 2,361 square feet, a number that may (or may not) reflect the current and actual size of the house given that current listing information shows the structure was originally built in 1927 and has 3 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms in an undisclosed amount of square footage.

Soon after she purchased the property Miz Murphy, according to a gushy, photo-thick article in the March 2012 issue of Vogue, hired skilled L.A.-based lady decorator Schuyler Samperton to do it all up in what Your Mama might (probably inaccurately and definitely awkwardly) describe as a sophisticated but quite cozy, modern-classic manner that merges and marries a plum example of quintessential SoCal Spanish-style architecture with a casually chic and pared down French country meets East Coast Americana type of day-core. (Yes? No?)

The step down living room has (antique looking) variable-width oak floors, wood-beams on the ceiling, and at least two arched niches for books, photos, mementos and hoozymagoozys. Windows on three sides include two sets of French doors that open directly to the front garden. Miz Murphy and Miz Samperton the lady decorator kept things bright and airy in the living room with matte but none-the-less lustrous white plaster walls. They furnished the space simply and somewhat symmetrically with a masculine pair of burnt caramel-colored leather wing back chairs that square off over a low-profile wood and iron coffee table with a curvy, more feminine slip-covered sofa all set conversationally on a textural sisal rug in front of a protruding white-stucco fireplace on which are mounted with a quartet of small-antlered animal skulls.

The (antique-looking) oak floors in the living room continue into the dining room furnished with a lot of rustic, (antique-looking) distressed wood pieces, simple cloth panels over the windows, a upside-down bowl-shaped woven wicker pendant light and a bunch of linen slip-covered chairs.

The floors switch from oak to antique terra cotta in the eat-in, galley-style kitchen equipped with both butcher block and baker-friendly marble counter tops; a high-grade, stainless steel commercial-style range and hood and an adjoining laundry nook with poured concrete slop sink and poured concrete folding counter where simple, biscuit-colored cotton canvas curtains hide the no-doubt top end but still unsightly washer and dryer machines.

Between the living and dining rooms just off the front entrance, there's a small den/family room where, according to the Vogue article, Miz Murphy (and child) do not watch television.

The upstairs master suite has more oak wood floors, a window-wrapped nook and an over-sized, stone-floored bathroom with claw-footed soaking tube, separate glass and marble shower enclosure, double sinks set into an antique-looking breakfront and French doors that connect the airy and pale pooper to a private terrace.

The all-but perfect Pamela Burton-designed gardens look and feel more like they might surround a sun bleached farmhouse on the Côte d'Azur than a white-stucco Spanish in Brentwood. A river rock wall defines the long, crushed granite driveway that runs up the side of the property, olive (or olive-like) trees, crushed granite driveway and terraces for dining and lounging, a spa set into a geometric grid of lavender bushes, and a simple, rectangular plunge-sized swimming pool.

Although in between she owned photo-friendly properties in both Ojai (CA) and Brooklyn (NY), this isn't the first time Miz Murphy has owned a beautifully (re)done Spanish-style residence in Brentwood. In fact, about 4.5 years ago she sold—and we discussed—a similarly-decorated but larger Spanish-style residence on the very same street in the flats of Brentwood for $3,600,000 to a tech exec and his wife who appears to have once been in the television business.

Anyhoo, as we've already many times said already, Miz Murphy has long been in the expensive grip of The Celebrity Real Estate Fickle and before moving to the beautiful house in Brentwood she's now trying to sell Miz Murphy lived briefly in Brooklyn, NY and for a few years before that in pretty-damn-fab, early 20th century bungalow on a well-located multi-acre estate in low-key but still swanky Ojai, CA. Interested parties can stay tuned (or check back) for more details and discussion of those real estate cast offs as well as some speculation on where she might be moving her slender, peripatetic boo-tox next.

listing photos: Prudential California Realty

Babyface Edmonds 'Anxious' to Thin Portfolio

SELLER: Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds
LOCATION: Incline Village, NV
PRICE: $2,950,000
SIZE: 7,344 square feet, 7 bedroooms, 6 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Your Mama would bet the damn farm we're going to get a few bitter moans and groans from the architecturally and decoratively sensitive over the relative (un)worthiness of this particular celebrity-owned property but onward we press in the face of the expected exasperated hisses.

The Bizzy Boys at Celebrity Address Aerial recently tattled to Your Mama that impressively prolific, Grammy-winning singer/songwriter/producer Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds is eager to unload a huge and ho-hum house on a wooded hillside above Lake Tahoe in Incline Village, NV. A few minutes additional research on the internets revealed the asking price for Mister Babyface's indisputably luxurious and nicely sited but woefully generic-looking Incline Village manse was recently dropped to $2,950,000.

Mister Babyface doesn't cut the same wide swathe of celebrity that he used to but back in the day, children, he was a music industry tour de force who wrote and/or produced more than two dozen #1 hit songs. He was given three consecutive Grammys for Producer of the Year (1995-1997). In the 1980s, 1990s and into the 2000s he earned fame, fortune and respect writing and/or producing radio-friendly ditties for a glittery list of music industry heavy hitters who include (but are not limited to) Bobby Brown, Pebbles, Paula Abdul, Sheena Easton Patti LaBelle, Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross, Madonna, Whitney Houston, Brandy, Mary J. Blige, Chaka Khan, Janet Jackson, Beyoncé, Céline Dion and Pink.

In 1989 he and music industry muckety-muck L.A. Reid formed LaFace Records (now part of Sony Music Entertainment) whose roster of clients included Toni Braxton, TLC, Cee-Lo Green, OutKast and Usher, to name a few. In the mid-1990s he and now ex-wife Tracey Edmonds started a film and television production operation with credits that include Soul Food, Josie and the Pussycats, and College Hill.


His multi-pronged Showbiz efforts, needless to say, had Mister Babyface rolling in clover and living high on the real estate hog. In the mid-80s he dropped—according to property records—$3,375,000 on a massive manse in the hoity-toity Holmby Hills 'hood. The mansion was the last home of Jack Benny and is located across the street from The Playboy Mansion. He sold the superstar-style estate in May 2004 for a spine-straightening $21,500,000 to now bitterly divorced former L.A. Dodger's owners Frank and Jamie McCourt. As far as we know, based on press reports of their ugly (and public) split, lap-swimming ex-missus McCourt retains ownership of the 2.58 acre spread that now has an outdoor swimming pool and an even bigger, Olympic length indoor one.

Anyways...In March 1995 Mister Babyface and then-wife Tracey splashed out $1,900,000 to acquire the sizable Incline Village residence in question, now listed at $2,950,000.

Current listing information shows the two story house—let's call it a muted, Rocky Mountain Chalet-style affair since we can't conjure any other apt architectural genre—was built in 1992, spans 7,344 square feet and includes a total of 7 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, 3 fireplaces and a 3-car attached garage. Listing details are somewhat slim but do indicate the rather banal-looking and barely decorated brown and beige interiors are finished with top-grade materials including lots of cherry wood, marble, granite, mahogany and travertine.

The double height foyer with curving staircase and black crystal chandelier gives way to a large living room with vaulted ceiling and marble-faced fireplace flanked by over-sized windows that offer a sparkling, through-the-tree-tops view of Lake Tahoe. A built-in, pass-through wet bar (with dishwasher) separates the living room from the spacious dining room defined by gleaming (possibly mahogany) wood floors that continue in to the colossal eat-in kitchen outfitted with center work island and all the expected materials...granite, cherry, blah, blah, blah. A small, adjoining family room has a corner fireplace, (partially) paneled walls, a built-in entertainment center and a couple of painfully puny windows set uncomfortably high.

The master suite has a third fireplace, wall-to-wall carpeting, a private balcony with lake views, and an attached bathroom/dressing area equipped with double vanity and super-sized jetted tub surrounded by—you got it—swirly beige-on tan marble. A separate room somewhere in the house—we're not sure where—houses a tan-colored Jacuzzi tub also surrounded by swirly beige-on tan marble.

The downstairs living room open through a pair of French doors to a small deck and a wrap-around balcony on the second floor hangs partly over a shrubbery-enshrouded dining and entertainment terrace that extends off the back of the house. Rolling lawns, landscaped planting beds and stately trees surround the residence.

No doubt much to his chagrin and frustration and Mister Babyface, his scenically situated mansion has been for sale since March 2010 when it was first hoisted on the (open) market with an in-hindsight optimistic $3,500,000 asking price. Current listing information indicates Mister Babyface is open to a rental situation or lease with option to buy type of thing. The listing goes on to state the "Owner anxious" to sell and that (bargain hunting) interested parties should "submit all offers." Make of that, children, what y'all will. We're keeping our nose outta that fire.

A quick perusal of property records indicates that in addition to his Incline Village albatross Mister Babyface also owns a number of other houses and mansions in California and Nevada including a 7,508 square foot (mc)mansion in L.A.'s guard-gated Bel Air Crest neighborhood picked up in May 2004 for $4,100,000, a 3,614 square foot mock-Med tract house in a gated development in Rancho Cucamonga, CA bought in February 2008 for $780,000, and a non-descript tract house in Las Vegas, NV acquired way back in June 1996 for $255,000.

In April 2004, just before he and then-missus Tracey announced their split, Mister Babyface shelled out $5,150,000 for an 8,245 square foot (mc)mansion in the star-stocked guard-gated Mulholland Estates community. The hulking house—just down the street from Paris Hilton's pad and Charlie Sheen's lair—is now owned by his Stanford educated entertainment industry executive ex-wife Tracey Edmonds who—in case anyone might be curious—fake-married comedian Eddie Murphy on Bora Bora in 2008 and now runs around with not-quite-divorced former professional footballer Deion Sanders. Does the lady know how to pick 'em or does the lady know how to pick 'em?

Anyhoo...

listing photos: Coldwell Banker Select Real Estate

In Other Malibu Celebrity Property News...

...Long-time Malibu, CA residents and vocal environmentalists Pierce Brosnan and Keely Shaye have (somewhat surprisingly) put their recently-completed ocean-front compound on Malibu's (quickly disappearing) Broad Beach up for lease at $250,000 per month for July and August (2012). They will be away, it seems, while the Irish 007 star makes his next picture.

Mister Brosnan and Miz Shaye purchased the extra-wide property way back in 2000. Rather than remodel they knocked down the existing residence to make way for a massive, U-shaped mansion—done up in a Thai-Bali-inspired-style and dubbed Orchid House—that commands a 120-foot wide ocean front lot, spans around 13,000 square feet and includes a total of 4 bedrooms and a dozen full bathrooms. No puppies, Your Mama did not make a silly, boozy mistake. Marketing materials do indeed show Orchid House contains twelve, presumably low-flow terlits, a bloated number sufficiently high enough to require the Brosnan-Shaye family employ a part-time, minimum-wage gal whose sole responsibility is to clean crappers with a myriad of chemical-free cleaning products.

Besides all the expected public and less-public rooms that connect through walls of glass to scads of courtyards, terraces and decks, Orchid House's extra-added interior amenities include a chef-style kitchen, library, art studio, music room, private screening room with bar, full-sized fitness facility and an indoor Japanese spa with soaking tub, infrared or traditional sauna, steam room and cold plunge.

Outdoor amenities include a gated driveway and motor court capable of parking 10 cars; a wind-protected entry courtyard around which the house wraps; expansive, multi-level stone terraces and decks that extend off the side and back of the mansion; an algae-green but not-doubt meticulously maintained saltwater swimming pool and spa with nearby cabana; lush, tropical landscaping; raised sunbathing deck; and an ocean-side dining terrace with full-height glass wind shield.

Avid celebrity property watchers will recall that back in June 2010 Mister B. and Miz S. put their previous and much-more-modestly-scaled Malibu home on the market with an in-hind-sight-optimistic asking price of $3,900,000. The gated Mediterranean, which backs up to and borders busy and often traffic-chocked Pacific Coast Highway finally sold in December 2011 for $2,600,000.

If a quarter million a month for the Brosnan-Shaye's Orchid House comes in a bit too steep for your pinched pocketbook, all-but-retired sitcom star Paul Reiser's ocean front getaway in Malibu Colony is also up for lease with a much lower but—let's be honest—still sky-high price tag of $95,000 per month. But, of course, it only has 3.5 bathrooms.

listing photos: Coldwell Banker / Malibu West

Funnyman Jim Carrey Lists Malibu Colony Crib

SELLER: Jim Carrey
LOCATION: Malibu, CA
PRICE: $13,950,000
SIZE: 2,866 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 5.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: For almost a year Canadian-born comedian Jim Carrey has been a hot topic in all the property gossip columns and (celebrity) real estate oriented blogs from Brooklyn to Malibu. Not only has the L.A.-based Golden Globe winner been repeatedly spotted checking out a-lister digs in New York City, he's just put his ocean front beach house inside the 24-hour guarded gates of Malibu Colony in Malibu, CA on the market with an asking price of $13,950,000.

This isn't, as it turns out, Mister Carrey's first turn on the bucking bronco at this particular real estate rodeo. The folks at Redfin show Mister Carrey first (an unsuccessfully) attempted to unload he seaside bedsit between June and December 2011 when it was listed, de-listed and re-listed a couple of times at a couple of prices.

Always on (and sometimes annoying) Mister Carrey has mucked around Hollywood since the early 1980s but it wasn't until he was cast as the elastic-faced white guy on the sketch comedy program In Living Color in 1990 that he really started up his ladder of fame of fortune. A lot of really stupid but often high-grossing comedies followed including (but far from limited to) Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask, Dumb & Dumber and The Cable Guy, an horrific cinematic turd that reportedly earned him a gasp-inducing $20,000,000 paycheck.

Mister Carrey wisely shifted gears in the late 1990s with less hokey-jokey roles in The Truman Show and Man on the Moon. Since the turn of the 21st century Mister Carrey has careened from low-brow comedies like Bruce Almighty, Yes Man and Mister Popper's Penguins to more artsy and (arguably) dignified ditties like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events and I Love You Phillip Morris.

Property records and the long-legged blond at Trulia Luxe Living both reveal Mister Carrey scooped up his ocean front crib in Malibu Colony in October 2002 for $9,750,000.

Current listing information puts the house at a fairly modest (and small-sounding) 2,866 square feet with a total of 5 bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms that include a staff suite and second floor master suite with head-on ocean view, fireplace flanked by custom-fitted cabinetry, a built-in flat screen screen tee-vee, private pooper, walk-in closet and direct access to a glass-railed terrace perfect for star-gazing and post-coital smoking.

A narrow walkway runs alongside the attached two-car garage to the front door that opens into a tile-floored, open-plan main living area and floating staircase embellished some of the most upsetting artwork—or "artwork"—on which Your Mama has ever had the displeasure to lay our boozy eyes. We well understand that beauty (and art) is deeply personal and held in the eye of the beholder but the gnarled and twisted, multi-colored driftwood hoozymagoozy affixed to the staircase gives Your Mama and The Dr. Cooter both a bone-chilling case of the willies and the sponge-painted banister is, well, unspeakable as are the pair of "paintings" on the towering wall of frosted glass behind the staircase.

The open plan main living space includes a living room with fireplace, built-in wood cabinets and a flat screen tee-vee with a truly gawd awful sponge-painted frame; a dining room with built-in storage buffet and frosted windows along one wall; a well-equipped kitchen with flat-fronted maple (or maybe birch) cabinetry that extend clear to the ceiling, speckled (and dated-looking) granite counter tops, a Suburu-sized center island with snack counter, and a slew of high-grade stainless steel appliances.

A built-in wet bar separates the living/dining/kitchen space from the kind of wee, window-wrapped family room that spills out through floor-to-ceiling glass sliders to a good-sized deck—with planks laid at a 45-degree angle to the house—that accommodates an outdoor dining area, surfboard storage racks, built-in barbecue center and elevated sunbathing and ocean-watching platform. Listing information indicates the deck has removable privacy walls for when Mister Carry and his guests want to run around nekkid on the deck without being seen by any people or paps who might be strolling and trolling along the thin strip of sand between the house and the surf. A third floor roof terrace is outfitted with more sun bathing loungers, an above ground spa tub and—according to listing information—mood lighting.

Malibu Colony has a long and storied history of wealthy and/or high-profile property owners who include (but are far from limited to) Barbara Stanwyk, Gloria Swanson, Jackie Collins, Linda Ronstadt and Jane Leeves. Tom Hanks owns two houses, one on the water and one directly across the street. At some point in the past Sting and Trudie Styler leased their Malibu Colony residence to Leonardo DiCaprio who now owns his own 7 bedroom and 6 bathroom crib in the Colony recently put up for lease at $75,000 per month. Survivor producer and The Apprentice creator Mark Burnett and wife Roma Downey own a house in Malibu Colony as does spike-haired super-producer Brian Grazer who's had his three-story beach front digs on and off the market for years. British-born action flick stud Jason Statham recently bought in Malibu Colony and Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen recently sold. Peri Gilpin (Fraser, Hot in Cleveland) bought her land-side beach house two summers ago for $3,550,000 from Shabby Chic queen Rachel Ashwell and Tinseltown tart Pamela Anderson reportedly almost went broke remodeling her land-side house in Malibu Colony. Media mogul Jerry Perenchioowns—by our unscientific count—at least a dozen homes in Malibu Colony as well as the adjacent private golf course that sits behind tall walls between the exclusive enclave and the Pacific Coast Highway.

In addition to he Malibu residence, Mister Carrey has long owned an 8,028 square foot sprawler with guest house, swimming pool and tennis court in L.A.'s low-key but high-priced Brentwood area he bought, according to property records, in July 1994 for $3,800,000. In early 2000 he dropped another $1,700,000 on the 1.02 acre lot next door with separate (but connected) gated entrance, small parking area, meandering lawns and plaza-sized entertainment terrace.

Mister Carrey's nearby neighbors in Brentwood include night time chat show host Conan O'Brien, entertainment industry executive Marc Weinstock and tabloid-embattled movie star John Travolta and his wife Kelly Preston.

As he thins his west coast property portfolio multiple reports reveal Mister Carrey would like to acquire a New York City pied-a-terre. Last year he leased a swank apartment at one of the star-studded, Richard Meier-designed green glass towers that lord over a lower section of the West Side Highway in the far West Village and he was said to be shopping for a downtown pad in the $5-8,000,000 range. More recently he's been spotted peeping at a titanic triplex penthouse in Brooklyn's Dumbo 'hood listed at $19,000,000 and a 7,000 (ish) square foot townhouse in the the the art gallery-filled Cheslea neighborhood with an asking price of $13,650,000.

listing photos: Sotheby's International Realty / Pacific Palisades

Afternoon Tidbit: Lena Dunham Buys in Brooklyn

BUYER: Lena Dunham
LOCATION: Brooklyn, NY (Cobble Hill)
PRICE: $500,000
SIZE: (approximately) 800 square feet, 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: A little birdie in Brooklyn chirped to Your Mama that up-and-coming filmmaker, screenwriter and actress Lena Dunham recently bought her first bachelorette pad apartment in the tony and genteel Brooklyn Heights 'hood just across the murky East River from lower Manhattan.

A brief but none-the-less exhausting search of the interweb indicates the Brooklyn Heights apartment picked up by Miss Dunham in mid-March (2012) wasn't on the open market but property records and other online documentation do reveal she coughed up $500,000 for an approximately 800 square foot, 1 bedroom and 1 bathroom co-operative apartment on the top floor of Mansion House, a large and dignified, pre-war doorman building just around the corner from the Clark Street subway station on a fairly narrow but urbanely charming tree-lined street. Unfortunately for the curious, that's about all the details we have about Miss Dunham's new digs.

Twenty six year old Miss Dunham created and currently stars as the endearingly clunky, slightly zaftig and hardly employed Hannah Horvath on the Judd Apatow-produced coming-of-age comedy Girls, a smart and hipsterish (if a weensy bit precious) boob-toob send up of early Sex and The City without all the Manolos and shiny Tinseltown tinsel.

Before Girls Miss Dunham earned accolades and attention for writing and starring in the quirky, 2010 feature-length film Tiny Furniture, a sort of semi-autobiographical story of an unsatisfied recent graduate of a liberal arts college in the Midwest who moves back in to her mother's loft in New York City's TriBeCa neighborhood. Miss Dunham, dontcha know, graduated from Oberlin and comes by her creative bent quite genetically as the older daughter of accomplished Pictures Generation artist Laurie Simmons and (orifice-obsessed) painter Carroll Dunham who live—you got it—in a big ol' loft in TriBeCa, the very same loft, as it turns out, featured in Tiny Furniture.

We expect more (and probably increasingly mainstream) films and television programs will be created by Miss Dunham and with her fast-tracked climb up the Showbiz ladder of fame and fortune Your Mama anticipates Miss Dunham will make a real estate upgrade in 2-3 years. Then again, what do we know? We shall see, butter beans, we shall see.

exterior photo: Google

Michael C. Hall Splits and Sells

SELLER: Michael C. Hall
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,995,000
SIZE: 3,525 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3 full, 1 half and 1 one-quarter bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Yesterday, after a long drive home down the dramatic and sunny California coast, Your Mama decided to jump right back in the celebrity real estate saddle and spent a few minutes perusing some of the newer listings in Los Angeles. We quickly came across a contemporary crib in the star-stocked Outpost Estates neighborhood described on current listing information as a "celebrity-owned" and the celebrity owner, as per our rudimentary research, is accomplished stage and screen actor Michael C. Hall who has his hillside house in the Hollywood Hills up for grabs with a $1,995,000 price tag.

Mister Hall, in case y'all don't know, has a background in the thee-ay-tuh and has tread the boards both on and off Broadway in scores of musical productions like Chicago and any number of Shakespearean ditties. His big Showbiz break came in the early Aughts when he was cast as a conflicted and closeted homosexual funeral home director on Six Feet Under. Currently and for the last six seasons Mister Hall has shaken his good-lookin' money maker as a creepy, blood splatter pattern analyst who also happens to be a vigilante serial killer on Dexter, a role that has earned him five Emmy nominations and four Golden Globe nominations (plus one Golden Globe win).

Property records indicate Mister Hall purchased his Outpost Estates residence in April 2008 for $1,750,000. This was just 7 or 8 months before he married Jennifer Carpenter who plays his adoptive sister on Dexter. The couple announced they'd split up in late 2010 and their union was officially and legally terminated in December 2011. The divorce may (or may not) have something to do with Mister Hall putting his L.A. home on the market.

Current listing information shows the three-story house, tucked into a steep, up-sloping lot on a quiet and curvaceous canyon road, was originally built in 1933 and was the private residence of master mid-century modern architect Hal Leavitt from 1964 to 2004. There are a total of 4 bedrooms and 3 full and one half and one quarter bathroom, according to marketing materials.

The main floor entry sits high above the street with a half flight stairs that descend into the voluminous, living room with fireplace, blond wood floors, pitched and painted wood-beam ceiling, and over-sized windows with canyon and mountain views. The original dining room is now a sitting room  with built-in wet bar with open shelving, and the existing dining room was added at the back of the house with a plaid-like pattern of wood beams and sky-lights overhead and a wide glass slider that connects to the terraced backyard entertainment areas.

The fully-updated eat-in kitchen, also at the back of the house, has grey Italian tile flooring, sleek but warm walnut cabinetry, taupe-colored subway tile back splashes, some sort of engineered stone counter tops, high-grade commercial-style appliances (most but not all of which are stainless steel), and a cozy, sky-lit space for informal meals.

The four bedrooms are well-separated for privacy and include two guest/family bedrooms (plus at least one pooper) on the upper level, a main floor master suite with canyon view and sky-lit bathroom with walnut cabinetry and sea foam green tile work, and a possible fourth bedroom on the lower level with cork flooring and built-in bench seating. Mister Hall outfitted the lower level bedroom (with attached facility) with various body fitness devices to keep his muscles firm.

A lounging terrace tucked between the back of the house and the raised swimming pool has a built-in barbecue center and built-in fire pit. A concrete stair and path climbs up the hillside and around the back of the pool to an elevated dining terrace cantilevered over the plunge-sized swimming pool.

Mister Hall's neighborhood is well-known for its celebrity residents (and homeowners) who include surrealist filmmaker David Lynch, new mommy actress Charlize Theron, British action flick stud Jason Statham (who bought his house last year from Ben and Christine Stiller), octogenarian bon vivant, author/esssayist and social commentator Gore Vidal, Felicity Huffman and William H. Macy. Both Orlando Bloom and Kyle Maclachlan own homes in the Outpost Estates and have attempted to lease them out at various times.

listing photos: The Agency