Friday, March 16, 2007

Is Byron Allen Flipping Out?


SELLER: Bryon Allen
LOCATION: Nightingale Drive, Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $6,995,000
SIZE: 3,562 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: Most fabulous view in LA. Downtown, Century City, and ocean! Sexy, mid century modern. Celebrity owned. Private and gated. 3 Bd/3.5 ba and maid's. Open floor plan with walls of glass and head-on city views. Huge yard with pool–and entertainer's paradise...Live on top of the world.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: This house, owned through a trust, belongs to Byron Allen. Do any of the children remember him? Your Mama had to pull his name up through the haze of our fading memory. Truth be told, we thought Mr. Allen disappeared into obscurity after Real People was cancelled in 1984. But, turns out he did not. Ladies and gentlemen, he's very busy. And he's rich.

The man produces, directs, writes and currently hosts something called Comics Unleashed on the Fox Channel. Your Mama can hardly watch stand up comics without vomiting from anxiety so that explains why we haven't tuned in to that program to know Mr. Allen is indeed alive and kicking.

Mister Allen makes most of his dough from a company he founded in 1993 called Entertainment Studios. According to their website, the company is the "largest independent producer/distributor of first run, syndicated programming for broadcast television stations." Heavens, we don't even know what that means? They do whaaat? Is that English?

It's unclear to Your Mama whether Mr. Allen ever lived in this Bird Street house or if he's flipping it for a few million more than he paid. However, we suspect he's flipping. First of all, property records indicate the house was purchased in June of 2005 and we know for a fact the place has has had a significant amount of work done in the last year or so. Secondly it has been staged with a truck load of mid-century and contemporary furniture to make it look sexy and glamorous. And it does. But it also looks like no one actually lives there. Did you note there is no shampoo in the shower?

Whatever the case, this house melts Your Mama's butter. The house may fit every cliche about and LA property, but that's all right by us. We might go with a darker putty color on the exterior of the house to further chill it out and we don't care for a good amount of the furniture, but once you get in that front door this place blows our mind. Seriously.

Your Mama is appreciating the way the walls were dealt with in the living and dining rooms. The floor to ceiling zebra wood has been lovingly and thoughtfully matched to create a uniform pattern. This was also done in the den where the delicious Carrara marble is naughtily patterned in such a way as to resemble lady parts. Which we think is a nice touch in a masculine house with such severe and straight lines.

The kitchen looks functional and nicely up to date without being so tragically mo-derne that it will need to be replaced in a year or two. We also dig the the breakfast room with the vintage Panton fixture. We would like to see a splash of color on the wall here to set it all off, but that's a minor and easy fix.

The back of the house slides open to one of the best backyards in the Bird Streets. Not only is it private, the view is giant. An added bonus: the low maintenance landscaping. The Guatemalan gardeners won't have much to do back here. Your Mama likes the idea of backyard artwork, but that sculpture can go.

We're going to go call our LA real estate agent right now. Your Mama needs to know if the windows on this place have a UV coating to protect our art works.

What do the children think? Is it priced right?

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's priced alright ... Rather spend an extra $3 million & buy 9258 next door ...

Your Mama said...

Both houses were done by the same designer. 9258 is outrageous and lavish, but there's no view from the pool and Your Mama prefers a view from the pool.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, the pool & interior colour scheme in 9258 sucks but architecturally it's nicer ...

Your Mama said...

Hi Hunny...who are you that you know these houses? Emal Your Mama.

Anonymous said...

Hi Mama! I absolutely agree about 9258. What were they thinking putting the pool in an enclave behind the master? Had they done the pool right, I'd buy that house in a NY minute. Instead their going to have to keep dropping price to chase the market down... Sad thing is, Byron might still need to as well. $2000/ft is a tall order no matter what the view. Personally, I'd rather buy a jet for that money and fly my Mama somewhere super special.

Anonymous said...

Hola, mama. Yes, me likey this one too! The interior feels like a combination of two celeb homes - Tom Ford's Richard Neutra meets the former Pitt/Aniston's Wallace Neff. The carrera marble is very similar to the way Mr. Pitt treated it in his living room.

P.S. I'm with you on the pool situation, though I do prefer the neighboring home. The views from the Bird Streets are just sick! And that's one sickness I don't hate!

Anonymous said...

I wanna buy 9258, demolish the master and pool and then rebuild the master in the pools place and the pool where the master was. Sounds good to me, now where the hell did i leave my credit card?!

Anonymous said...

The 9258 home is nice but ridiculously cold on the interior. Steve Hermann carried the black color "sexy" theme too far throughout the home. I love 9262(Byron's home) but I would like to know why the kitchen is not open to the living room for entertaining purposes (a load bearing wall perhaps)

Anonymous said...

I worked for this guy, what a joke! That is what they're doing and they do it all the time. His Mom is a huge pain in the butt and thinks she knows all about Real Estate. This guy employs his family to make his money for him and he treats them all like crap!

anonymous said...

Worked with this guy too. Typical "hollywood" should be honored to do work with him and everything for basically free because of who he is. At best B-list... Nice house but there are better deals to be had. Dont think he has ever lived there either...

Anonymous said...

I worked with this guy as well, and I found him to be, Very Nice And generous, to his family and his employees. I recommend next time you have an opportunity to learn what his mother was trying to share with you about real estate you should listen so perhaps you can be as successful as she is, and as far as "Typical Hollywood" negotiating for better prices.. maybe that's why he has a 7 million dollar house that he's never slept in... and you Don't!.. and my guess is he has plenty more around the world.
Next time you have the opportunity to work with someone that successful do yourself a favor KEEP THE JOB! it may lead to you owning property that other people are blogging about.

Anonymous said...

Mr. Allen is a very nice guy. I had the chance to work with him and it got screwed up quite abit. He always was courteous and was very astute in his business. He is demanding but that isnt always a bad thing.