America’s ‘most expensive home’ for sale for $119m after price cut

Mansion was featured in The Godfather and Beyonce’s Black Is King

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

The “most expensive home on the market” in the US has undergone a price cut and the hiring of an international realtor after being on sale on and off for more than a decade.

In December, the Beverly House, located in Beverly Hills, California, was listed on the market for $119m (£90m) after it was initially listed at $165m in 2007, $95m in 2010, $195m in 2016 and $135m in 2018.

The home, which once belonged to newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst and actress Marion Davies, who owned the mansion until 1967, was designed by architect Gordon Kaufmann and built in 1926 for Milton Getz.

Over the years, the mansion has boasted notable guests as well, including John F Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy, who used the home as a honeymoon destination and as the president’s West Coast election headquarters, and Beyonce, who featured The Beverly House in filming and visuals for her album Black Is King.

The Beverly House has also made its way onto the silver screen, with the home featured in the 1992 film The Bodyguard and The Godfather.

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While the price alone is impressive, the mansion’s amenities are what make it stand out, with the home, located at 1011 North Beverly Drive and situated on 3.5 acres, featuring 18 bedrooms and 25 bathrooms.

London agency helps with listing of US’s most-expensive house for sale (The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

The house, which is designed in classic Italian and Spanish palatial styles, also includes a two-storey library and reflection pools and waterfalls that lead to a near-Olympic sized swimming pool “bordered by pillared Roman temple facades, in the style of the famous Neptune Pool at Hearst Castle”.

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

The sheer size of the mansion means it has terraces able to accommodate 400 or more guests for a seated dinner and grounds to accommodate more than 1,000 people, according to the listing, which notes that there is also a formal dining room, a breakfast room and a family room with an outdoor terrace.

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

The colossal 28,975 sq ft house also features numerous amenities for entertaining as well, such as a billiards room, an Art Deco-style nightclub and wine cellar, a cinema room, a tennis court and a spa with a gym and massage room.

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

In addition to the enviable interior, the property includes gardens designed by “landscape architect Paul Thiene and inspired by the Emperor Hadrian’s villa in Tivoli,” and a guest house above an eight-car garage that comes with its own kitchen and four bedrooms.

After it proved difficult to sell the H-shaped home in the US, where it has been exclusively listed by The Agency since 2020, London’s Beauchamp Estates was appointed as the mansion’s only international agent.

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

With the listing, Beauchamp Estates said the “famous mega-mansion” will be marketed “to an international network of ultra-high-net-worth clients in London, Moscow, Tel Aviv, the Middle East and China/Hong Kong”.

“Potential buyers include the Saudi Royal family, the Abu Dhabi Royal family, Chinese and Hong Kong billionaires, the Thai Royal family or a Nigerian, Russian or South African commodities billionaire,” the luxury real estate agency said.

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

“Beauchamp Estates is delighted to be appointed exclusively as the only agent outside of the US to manage the international marketing of The Beverly House, one of the most magnificent private estates in California that is truly anchored in American legend. This is one of the most prestigious instructions for an American estate to be given to a London agency in many years and will appeal to our high-net-worth clients around the world,” Gary Hersham, the founding director of Beauchamp Estates, said.

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

(The Beverly House / Beauchamp Estates)

In 2019, the Chartwell Estate in Los Angeles broke the California record for most expensive sale when it was purchased for $150m.

The record was then reportedly beaten by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who purchased a home in February 2020 for $165m.