LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,325,000
SIZE: 3,100 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 3.25 bathrooms
YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Late last week Your Mama dissed and discussed the just put up for sale Sherman Oaks (CA) mock-Med mini-mansion of former American Idol judge Paula Abdul. This week we're gonna start with a Celebrity Real Estate Double Whammy about a pair of recent real estate transactions by Aerosmith's scarftastic front man and current American Idol judge Steven Tyler.
Mister Tyler has been shaking his money maker in the Bizness of Show more than 40 years and he's the recipient of multiple Grammys, AMAs and MTV Music Awards. He's lived, much to the delight and intrigue of fans, the electric and punishing life of a rock star, not the new fangled sort of rock stardom of juice fasts and Buddha statues but the Old School kind of hardcore drugs and indiscriminate recreational sex. Nowadays, although still every bit the rock star with his somewhat androgynous maquillage and high maintenance hairdo, he comes across as an easy-going, kind, thoughtful and genuine man who walks pretty damn squarely in the sincere but sometimes loopy Loobeetawns of his A.I. predecessor Paula Abdul and who—bringing us back to topic—went on a bit of a real estate buying spree last year purchasing luxury abodes in both Hawaii and Los Angeles, CA.
Fashion writer and celebrity gossip Merle Ginsberg reported in early August 2011 in the Hollywood Reporter that an unidentified woman walked into the swank, star-studded Sunset Tower Hotel on the Sunset Strip and was overheard tattling to the desk clerk she needed to book a room for a month or two because—so the story goes—sixty-sumpin' year old rock star Steven Tyler and his long term gal pal-fiancée Erin Brady had toured her nearby house, which she (allegedly) explained had been on the market for some time, and offered to buy the house on the spot with everything in it and with all cash if she agreed to leave that night. Apparently (and allegedly), the lady agreed to those rather absurd terms.
Listen puppies, we are nobody compared to the well-regarded Miz Ginsberg and we do not question that she reported what she heard accurately, but it seems simply ludicrous to Your Mama that Mister Tyler would make that sort of demand of a person selling their home. We might expect that sort of real estate nonsense from one or another of the more demanding American Idol judges but not of the oddly, surprisingly and pleasantly down to earth-seeming Mister Tyler. Then again, what do we know about anything? Certainly nada-zilch-nil about Mister Tyler's allegedly stiff-armed negotiating tactics.
We also do not, natch, have any idea if that disturbing and sad story of celebrity entitlement is true or not but we do know from The Bizzy Boys at Celebrity Address Aerial that in the last days of July (2011) the wide-mouthed and long-haired Demon of Screamin' did indeed acquire a house high above L.A.'s legendary Laurel Canyon. However—and make of this what y'all will—the property in question was not sold, according to the property records we peeped, by a woman but rather a man who owned the house since at least the late 1990s and over the years borrowed regularly and heavily against its equity. Twice in the mid- and late-Aughts, public records show, lenders initiated foreclosure proceedings. Finally, just in the nick of time, along came Mister Tyler (and soon-to-be-third Missus Tyler) who snatched up the 3-story, ridge-line residence as a short-sale in late July 2011 for $1,325,000.
Listing information shows the post-modern minded main house was built in 1987 and measures about 3,100 square feet with three bedrooms and a total of 2 full, 2 half and 1 quarter bathrooms. The house, with a front facade partially perforated by a rigid grid of pin-prickish windows, sits privately on a flattened promontory above Laurel Canyon with what can quite legitimately be called a thrilling, sweeping and, yes, jetliner view across Los Angeles from east of downtown to, on a clear day, the Pacific Ocean.
Laurel Canyon, music lovers and celebrity real estate watchers well know, is steeped and gilded in music and showbiz history and lore. The rugged ravines, steep hillsides and snaking ridges have a long history of residents that well qualify as music industry icons such as—to name a paltry few—the incomparable Joni Mitchell, deliciously irreverent and experimental Frank Zappa, hard-driving howler Cass Elliot, Beach Boys' Brian Wilson, super-groupie Pamela Des Barres, Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo, and the Rolling Stones who in the 1970s shacked up en masse for a short spell in the same Appian Way house atop Laurel Canyon where Marilyn Manson lived and recorded in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Mister Tyler's new west coast abode sits, according to property records, three small but separate parcels. The usable portion of the land makes an flag-shape as its stretches back from the street with the main house perches on the hillside at the extreme ass-end of the property, well out of view of looky-loos, garbage men, and dog-walking nosy neighbors on the street.
A 4-car, electronically gated carport is about all that can be seen from the street. At the rear of the car port a short set of steps ascends to a door set into a windowless wall that forms the rear boundary of a detached structure of unknown purpose that is definitely not the main house and may (or may not be) a guest house, pool house, recording studio, home fitness center, potting shed and/or whatever.
Because the main house sits as far from the street as the geography and building restrictions allow, in order to get to the front door a person must not only walk the entire length of long carport and up the stairs to the entry gate but also traverse the property's primary outdoor entertainment area along a narrow brick walkway that parallels the entire length of the swimming pool.
This somewhat unusual set up with the black-bottom swimming pool set in tight proximity to the house, in what is effectively the front yard, probably works just fine once you're on the property. Howevuh hunties, Your Mama can assure the children that our imperious house gurl Svetlana and any number of our boozier and hence less stable friends would surely balk at having to schlep the long distance from the car port to the kitchen with hands full of cocktails and armfuls of groceries and cleaning supplies. No doubt ol' Sveta would insist we supply her with a golf cart or electric scooter to ease her burden. Imagine for a moment, if you will, attempting to make that walk at 3:30 am in a pair of cockamamie pony heels (and downright criminal multi-color hose) after three too many gin & tonics. Mister Tyler may be sober now but we still suggest he consider keeping a speedo-suited lifeguard on duty at all times just in case any of his less sober guests partake a tipple or two of something merry making and possibly illegal.
Anyhoo, details of the house are few, but listing information and marketing materials Your Mama dug up out of the interweb do show the living room has very blonde and lustrous hardwood floors, a fireplace, and a pair vast expanses of asymmetrically-paned windows that frame and cut up the otherwise unobstructed rock star view, at night a magnificent shimmering expanse of winking and twinkling lights. We know there are a lot of people who loathe Los Angeles for any number of (probably legitimate) reasons but, butter balls, even the haters have to acknowledge the night time view from Mister Tyler's living room above Laurel Canyon is—when weather and smog permit—nothing short of spectacular.
Your Mama hears through the celebrity real estate gossip grapevine that Mister Tyler had leased a very contemporary residence near the one he just purchased (as seen in this May 2011 interview with Matt Lauer). In addition to his new house in Tinseltown and his new Hawaiian hideaway, which we'll get to in a minute or two, Mister Tyler's property portfolio also includes (but may not be limited to) a large, lake front house in Sunapee, NH and a high-walled and gated estate tucked into the tail end of a shared private drive in the upscale and scenic seaside town of Marshfield, MA, about 30 miles outside of Boston.
listing photos: Nelson Shelton & Associates