SELLER: A BankLOCATION: Monte Cristo Way, Las Vegas, NV
PRICE: $3,100,000
SIZE: 16,461 square feet, 7 bedrooms, 10 bathrooms (some full, some half)
YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Buckle yourselves in for a bumpy ride babies because Your Mama is about to discuss the dead, or at least the former home of a dead person. It has come to Your Mama's attention that the massive Las Vegas mansion that deceased pop superstar Michael Jackson leased for about six months in late 2006 and part of 2007 has been sold for $3,100,000.
Perhaps some of you puppies are as bone-brained as Your Mama–who can barely remember what we had for breakfast even though it's still sitting on the damn kitchen table–so let's have a re-cap regarding how Mister Jackson and his children ended up in Las Vegas just before the Christmas holly-days in 2006. In the ugly aftermath of Mister Jackson's humiliating child molestation trial in 2005 (wherein he was acquitted of all charges), he scooped up his trio of toddler children, covered their little faces with gauzy head scarves and fled Neverland Ranch, his long time home/sanctuary/private amusement park in Santa Ynez, CA. Mister Jackson decamped for the Middle East where he was hosted for several months by a member of the Bahraini royal family and occasionally wore a burqa. That house guesting situation, as we all know, ended in tears, nasty allegations and, later, a lawsuit.
Mister Jackson then hightailed it for Ireland's scenic County Cork where he and the kiddies were put up at Castlehyde, the 18th-century estate owned by Michael Flatley, otherwise known–we're afraid–as the "Lord of the Dance." The so far over the top it's back on the bottom Castlehyde must have appealed to Mister Jackson who clearly craved theatrical, Busby Berkeley-esque residential accommodations. The Lord of the Dance's historic and epic manor house reportedly includes such amenities as climate controlled coat rooms, a 3-story library filled with first editions, a sound-proofed music room, an African safari room, two "Jesus juice" cellars, a whiskey room, a 20-seat theater, a Roman spa with a mechanical massage room (whatever the hell that is we absolutely do not want to know), a hair salon–natch–and a gym. In addition to the massive master suite and a reformatory school sounding "children's dormitory," Mister Flatley had each of the many guest bedrooms lavishly did up and done over in themes that include the China room, American Presidents room, the French room, the Napoleon room, the Venetian room and the Beecher-Wrixon room. Your Mama will take any Four Seasons or even a Motel 6 any where else, thank you very much.
Anyoo, after about six months mooching off the Lord of the Dance, Mister Jackson packed up his children and his ladees' garments and headed for the glittery city of Las Vegas, NV where he leased a humongous house about three miles west of The Strip. Your Mama thinks Las Vegas was really the perfect place for Mister Jackson. While he was, technically, still referred to as the "King of Pop," by early 2007 he was in actuality little more than a strange and riveting tabloid side show with a fervent fan base who worshiped him and his music with an unapologetic and near religious zealotry. He was reportedly lured to Las Vegas by local biznessman Jack Wishna who hoped to engineer a comeback concert series he called "Rock City" that was designed to put Mister Jackson back on tippy top of the pop heap. But alas...that all came to naught, according to Mister Wishna, due at least in part to Mister Jackson's increasingly erratic behavior.
Anyhoo, Michael Jackson always was a real estate size queen–the main house at the 1,200+ acre Neverland Ranch topped 10,000 square feet–so it's really no surprise that he chose a hotel sized house in Las Vegas from which to stage his comeback and for which, it was rumored and reported, he paid $1,000,000 in rent. If that figure is true–and we're not convinced it is–Your Mama imagines that was for the entire lease period and not a per month cost because, let's be honest, what moron would pay a million dollars a month for a house in Las Vegas that looks to Your Mama like a tawdry highway-side motel outside Cleveland?
The walled and gated 1-acre corner property and the severely architecturally challenged house, which–the children may be amused to know–was bank owned at the time of the sale, was listed with an asking price of $3,950,000. According to listing information and listing agent Carolyn Mullany of Coldwell Banker Premier Realty, the house recently sold to a doctor and attorney couple from California who paid $3,100,000 for the dubious privilege of walking the same halls and using the same terlits as Michael Jackson.
According to listing information, the 16,461 square foot residential beast includes a squat looking porte-cochere with valet stand and coat check area that opens into a double height entrance hall that looks to Your Mama more like a mall in Sherman Oaks than a private residence. The all-beige interiors include a great room with a fireplaces and several seating areas, a dining room with scads of wooden built-ins, a vast kitchen/breakfast/family room area with chestnut colored cabinetry, black granite counter tops, commercial grade appliances and a built in breakfast table complete with, we regret to inform, a large lazy susan. What is it about lazy susans that cause Your Mama to recoil if decorative fright?
In addition to the 2 bedroom and 1 pooper staff suite, the mansion includes 7 bedroom suites including a sprawling 2,000+ square foot master bedroom complex with a couple of sitting areas–one in front of a fireplace and one in front of a large entertainment center, dual dressing rooms, a behemoth pooper with a 10-head shower with steam, jetted bathtub for two, and his and her terlits. There is also, according to listing information, a secret exit to a very private rooftop deck situated in such a way that, should he have so desired, Mister Jackson could have sunbathed in all his pale skinned glory without being seen by any neighbors even though the mansions in the area are squished up against each other just like they are in all the far less expensive tract developments that comprise the bulk of Las Vegas's housing stock.
Other amenities of the former Jackson rental include a home theater room, an orchestra loft–just what everyone needs at home, 3 office suites with a separate side-gate entrance, an elevator, a swimming pool with adjacent pool pavilion, a tennis court that does double duty as a basketball court, and a fitness room complete with a dry sauna and a dance floor.
According to the always entertaining and often obfuscating Raymone Bain–who was then Mister Jackson's aide-de-camp/PR princess and who later filed a $44,000,000 lawsuit against her former cash cow–Mister Jackson and family moved from the mansion on Monte Christo sometime in mid-2007 due to security concerns. Although it was confirmed that Mister Jackson left his Christmas tree up from December until he moved out in the following June, we have it on very good authority that, contrary to published reports, Mister Jackson left the property in, "impeccable condition."
We're not entirely sure where the Jackson Four lived immediately after vacating the leviathan Las Vegas mansion in June of 2007, but eventually they wound up in an opulent and gigantic mansion on the corner of Sunset Boulevard and N. Carolwood Drive in the Holmby Hills section of Los Angeles where, as every man, child and animal in the world knows, he died on June 25, 2009 of "acute propofol intoxication" administered by his personal physician, cardiologist Dr. Conrad Murray.
The Jackson children, bless their little hearts, reportedly live with their grandmother Katherine and any number of other Jackson family members at the family's long time estate in Encino, CA. We may poke fun of their pappy, but Your Mama wishes nothing but peace and happiness for those three children who will, no doubt, have a rough go of it just by the circumstance of their being Michael Jackson's (enormously wealthy) children.
P.S. This is almost entirely unrelated except for that Michael Jackson and his sequined glove is referenced, but it's so brilliant Your Mama had to share with the children.
photos: Coldwell Banker Premier Realty / Carolyn Mullany
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