Back in April, this giant house in prime Beverly Hills sold for exactly $60 million, marking the 90210’s priciest home sale in nearly two years. And though the new owner was not identified immediately, it should come as no surprise that all signs point to it being veteran real estate whale Thomas Laffont, a billionaire hedge fund tycoon with a fondness for buying perilously expensive homes everywhere from Malibu and Montecito to Silicon Valley and Pacific Palisades.
Originally built in the 1930s, the multi-winged house eventually came under the longterm ownership of actors Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman, who lived there for over 20 years before selling the place in 2015 for $28 million to high-end real estate investors Stuart and Stephanie Liner.
The Liners essentially gutted and rebuilt the former Devito house into something truly grand and remarkably huge. And in 2018, they successfully flipped the place for $64 million to Australian billionaire James Packer, best known to the general public as Mariah Carey’s ex-fiancée. Packer ultimately took a multimillion-dollar loss on the place when flipping it to Laffont, though he did first manage to rent it out to then-married actors Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck, who briefly lived there in early 2023.
Today, the property bears little resemblance to its far more humble 1930s beginnings. Hidden behind towering hedges at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac, the gated compound includes at least three separate structures that altogether pack 12 bedrooms and a whopping 18 bathrooms into 25,000 square feet of living space.
There are also not one but two separate garages, which combined have eight covered parking spots, plus a substantial motorcourt for guest and vendor parking. From the motorcourt, a walkway shaded by mature sycamore trees leads past white columns to the main house’s blacked-out front door.
Inside, black-and-white checkerboard stone floors in the double-height foyer change to lustrous hardwood in the living room, which sports a fireplace and an adjoining office/den. Also on the main level are a movie theater, a formal dining room, a lounge with its own wet bar, and a marble-swaddled kitchen outfitted with a trove of top-of-the-line appliances.
Other highlights include an elevator that ferries occupants upstairs, where the primary suite is decked out with dual bathrooms and closets, plus a balcony overlooking the high-hedged backyard, where the pool/spa combo is joined by a lush lawn and separate poolhouse with its own bedroom, bathroom, kitchen and al fresco dining area. Also on the full acre of grounds are a full outdoor kitchen and another 2,800-square-foot building, which is probably most suitable as live-in staff quarters or staff offices.
The property also happens to lie in one of the poshest pockets in all of Beverly Hills, where some of the nearest homes are owned by mega-rich people like Hard Rock founder Peter Morton, Russian oligarch Yuri Milner, former WME CEO Ari Emanuel, tech entrepreneur Howie Liu and financier Scot French.
Laffont, 49, and his older brother Philippe co-founded Coatue Management, a New York City-based hedge fund that focuses on technology investments and now has more than $50 billion in assets under management. Forbes says Philippe is worth $6.5 billion; while they don’t seem to have a net worth estimate for Thomas, we’d guess it’s similarly substantial—according to our research, the younger Laffont currently owns at least $150 million worth of mortgage-free real estate.
Just last year, Laffont and his longtime wife Liz forked out $31.7 million for a substantial estate on Malibu’s Point Dume that includes a rambling house with more than 7,000 square feet of living space, plus 1.5 acres of flat land and a private, gated pathway leading down to scenic Little Dume Beach.
The Laffonts also owned at least three other Point Dume houses—including one sold to them by Julia Roberts—all of which they flipped after a couple years of ownership.
Just over two years ago, the Laffonts also dropped $47.5 million to buy a multi-parcel estate in prime Pacific Palisades. The seller was Ben Silverman, perhaps best known as an executive producer of “The Office.” After undergoing major renovations, part of that estate just popped back up for sale, asking $30 million.
Also two years ago, the Laffonts also dropped another $11.5 million to buy another lavish house elsewhere in Pacific Palisades, which has been occupied by familial relatives and is also currently back up for sale, asking $12 million.
While we have no intel on why the Laffonts are dumping their Pacific Palisades properties—both of which survived the recent wildfires—so soon, we would not be surprised in the least if the family no longer wants to live in the area given the broad decimation and upcoming years of constant construction.
Other properties recently owned by the Laffonts include a beautiful Montecito estate they bought for $11.7 million in 2021 and sold three years later for $16.5 million. They also formerly owned a Woodside compound in Northern California’s Silicon Valley that was sold in 2022 for nearly $18 million.
As for Packer, he’s moved on up to a $110 million mega-mansion in prime Bel Air that was once owned by embattled real estate developer Mohamed Hadid.
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