Dasmarka Real Estate

NOTE FROM YOUR MAMA: This is an amended re-posting of an earlier and incorrectly reported discussion on the recent sale of Elizabeth Taylor's long-time mansion in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles.

SELLER: Elizabeth Taylor
BUYER: Rocky Malhotra
LOCATION: Los Angeles (Bel Air), CA
PRICE: $8,600,000 (list)
SIZE: 7,000(ish) square feet, 6 bedrooms (plus staff suite)

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Property records (and previous reports) reveal that after just 33 days on the open market, the long-time Los Angeles, CA residence of beloved and recently deceased Tinseltown legend Elizabeth Taylor has been sold. The question is–natch–who bought it?

The extraordinarily wealthy, lauded and applauded Elizabeth Taylor went to meet The Great Director in the Sky in late March 2011 and by mid-May her 1.27 acre Bel Air estate, recently refreshed by nice, gay decorator Waldo Fernandez, was on the open market with a price tag of $8,600,000. Just after the fortified estate appeared on the market photos of the home and garden, which includes a guard house Miz Taylor had manned by armed Israeli-trained security personnel, appeared in the glossy pages of Architectural Digest.

Property records Your Mama peeped show Miz Taylor's 7,000(ish) square foot manse was purchased in mid- to late-June (2011) by an entity called Copa de Oro Realty, LLC for an (as yet) undisclosed amount of money.

With an assist from Our Fairy Godmother in Bel Air we did some snooping around on the interweb and quickly determined that Copa de Oro Realty, LLC links directly back to a Bel Air residence owned by the somewhat eccentric inventor/entrepreneur/real estate investor named Mark B. Barron (née Mark Bowen).

At first we thought–and reported–that Mister Barron was the new owner of Miz Taylor's house. However and alas, we were wrong, dead wrong, puppies. Thanks to a covert communique from an unimpeachable inside source, let's call her Cleo Clearsupthematter, the new owner is not Mister Bowen but rather businessman Rocky Malhotra. As per Miss Cleo Mister Malhotra leases Mister Bowen's house in Bel Air, which explains why the Copa de Oro Realty, LLC points directly to that particular (residential) address.

Mister Malhotra came by his fortune the old-fashioned way: He inherited it. The Malhotra family, certainly not a household name in the United States, have long-owned the India-based SuperMax World. Mister Malhotra is the chairman of SuperMax World, a successful global concern that manufactures and sells household items, specifically razor blades, shaving products and home manicure sets. There really is, children, so much money to be made in inexpensive but necessary items.
Anyhoo, Your Mama first thought–and reported–that Mister Barron had recently and inexplicably snatched up several high-priced properties in Bel Air. However, according to Miss Cleo, it's Mister Malhotra who quickly stuffed his property portfolio with a trio of pricey pads in Bel Air. In addition to Miz Taylor's storied mansion on Nimes Road, Mister Malhotra coughed up $8,000,000 in May 2011 for an 8,248 square foot pseudo-Gothic kinda-Tudor style pile (pictured above) on a gated 1.1 acre parcel on Bel Air's busy North Beverly Glen Boulevard.
The very month prior, property mad Mister Malhotra snatched up another Bel Air mansion, this time a stately but wildly outdated 6,209 square foot Paul Williams-designed hill top residence on ritzy Bellagio Road (pictured above) immediately next door to the Copa de Oro Road estate financially embattled actor Nic Cage lost to foreclosure last year. The neo-Palladian property, sold by showbiz attorney Larkin Arnold, was purchased in April 2011 for $8,675,000.

Property records indicate that the mansion owned by Mark Barron and leased by Mister Malhotra sits on the same tiny cul-de-sac where music mogul Quincy Jones, PayPal co-founder Elon Musk and soft-porn purveyor Joe Francis all own luxe homes. Mister Barron's pad is just around the corner from the down-on-its-heels Hollywood Regency-style mansion of Zsa Zsa Gabor, currently and still listed with an asking price of $15,000,000.

We queried Miss Cleo as to Mister Malhotra's plans for Miz Taylor's crib and she tattled to Your Mama that Mister Malhotra plans to maintain the house much as Miz Taylor left it and to eventually lease it out. Who else besides Your Mama thinks the first tenant will likely be some rich old queen with a thing for Liz Taylor?

listing photos (top): Teles Properties
listing photo (middle): Westside Estate Agency
listing photo (bottom): Westside Estate Agency