Some Incredible Houses

I was looking at the new house President Bush bought in Dallas.

Then I noticed the house behind him, which is the largest house in Dallas, owned by billionaire Tom Hicks, owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team. (Oh, and if you're wondering, President Bush bought the house on Daria Pl. directly to the rear of the mansion.)



One of my favorite passtimes is to look at the world's largest and most beautiful houses on maps.live.com. I really can get endless hours of entertainment from that.

Here are some other beautiful homes I've found:

Most expensive house in London ($100 million), on the most expensive street in the world, owned by Indian Lakshki Mittal, 4th richest man in the world. I've heard that he hasn't moved into the place yet. Apparently his wife doesn't like it.

Oprah's house overlooking The Channel Islands in California ($80 million). The grounds are huge, and you need a golf cart to get around the place. Oprah apparently wanted the place so bad, she badgered the couple that lived there until they sold.

Currently most expensive house in America, Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, outside of San Francisco ($170 million). A Japanese style compound built using 400-year old construction methods (blog entry I wrote), and a stone bridge imported from China.

The Phipps Estate outside of New York City (national park now, no price). If you look at the alignment of the trees, you can see that the estate used to run for many miles in each direction, and is now just a fraction of its original size.

The largest private house in New York State, owned by Ira Rennert (owns Humvee), located in Bridgehampton on the beach. People say that if it ever goes up for sale, it will be the take over title of most expensive home in America.

My favorite house of all, owned by Univision Mogul Jerrold Perenchio, in Bel Air, price unknown. However, owning a 20,000 square foot house and 9 acres of the most expensive real estate in California has to be expensive.

The Breakers, the summer home of Cornelius Vanderbilt II (wikipedia), in Newport, Rhode Island, now a national historic landmark. It originally cost $7 million to build in 1895 ($150 million in today's dollars). It's bigger than The White House.

The largest house in California, which used to belong to Aaron Spelling. Too bad he put it on such a small piece of property. At 56,000 square feet, it's just barely larger than The White House. It's currently for sale at $150 million. Nobody's buying.



And then finally, another personal favorite: The house with the ugliest exterior and most beautiful (modern) interior on earth, Portabello (website), currently for sale at $75 million. Nobody's buying.

Portabello has more amenities than a Las Vegas Casnio, including "2-story grotto with a pool, 2 spas, swim-up bar, tunnel slide, poolside lounge room and barbeque area; entertainment level with bowling alley, Art Deco theater, automotive museum, cafe, full exercise facility". (The automotive museum is fully stocked, including a gullwing Mercedes.)