Monday, August 24, 2009

Holly Madison Lists Condo at a Loss

SELLER: Holly Madison
LOCATION: Broadway Street, Santa Monica, CA
PRICE: $700,000
SIZE: 907 square feet, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: ...2 story open floor plan with spiral staircase, high ceilings, large windows & 2 balconies. Unit features fine Italian kitchen with Caesarstone counter tops, stainless steel appliances, custom designed bathrooms. 2 side-by-side parking, security system, video intercom system & keyfob entry building.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Life in Tinseltown ain't always pretty folks and iffin anyone were to ask Your Mama, which of course no one did, nobody is a better example of the rigmarole it takes to make it in Hollywood than those poor plastic boobed bottle blondies who in the service of furthering their careers in the shark-infested waters of the entertainment bizness spent the last 5 or 6 years as he ladee-frienss of octogenarian soft porn purveyor Hugh Hefner. For most of the last few years, the undisputed First Lady of the Playboy Mansion was not Mrs. Hefner, but a perky, twenty-something year old gal named Holly Madison who has long, over-processed platinum locks and glittery white teeth. The one tidbit of information Your Mama can recall about Miss Madison is that she had an exact replica of her hoo-hoo re-created in chocolate as a birthday present for Mister Hefner. No matter how one slices that turkey children, a chocolate version of your naughty bits ain't nuthin' if not Klassy with a capital "K."

Miss Madison bunked with Hef and the other gurls at the Playboy Mansion for a number of years–honestly chickens, we don't know or care how long it was–however, when her May-December romance with the old man was coming to an end in the summer or fall of 2008, the young and nubile Miss Madison scooped up a lofty condo in Santa Monica, CA which, thanks to a covert communique from Candy Apples, we've learned she currently has on the market with an asking price of $700,000.

In addition to appearing as Hef's main squeeze on the reality program Girls Next Door for the last 5 or 6 years, Miss Madison has racked up a long list of guest appearances in films and on game shows, talk shows and reality programs such as Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Larry King Live, The Tyra Banks Show, The House Bunny, The Telling, Celebrity Family Feud, Criss Angel Mindfreak, Living Lohan, the always luridly depressing Keeping up with the Kardashians and the ever-popular but deeply upsetting Dancing with the Stars. More recently Miss Madison has been hanging her d-cups in Las Vegas where sh led a world record breaking parade of bikini wearing women down Las Vegas Boulevard and, in a career move not likely to pave the path to being taken seriously as an actress, she is currently baring her already oft bared breasts in Peepshow, a burlesque extravaganza at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino in Las Vegas.

Records Your Mama accessed show that Miss Madison paid $760,000 for her Broadway Street condo in August of 2008 which was actually a few months before she announced on–natch–gossip juggernaut TMZ that her relationship with ol' Hef was kaput. Soon after closing on the quite petite 907 square foot condo and furnishing the mostly white-walled rooms with a lot of black and shiny things, Miss Madison had a real estate change of heart and flipped her 2 bedroom and 2 pooper crib back on the market in June of 2009. It does not take any flicking of the well worn beads on our bejeweled abacus to see that with it's current price tag of $700,000 Miss Madison will likely loose somewhere in the neighborhood of $100,000 on the sale of this little lived in condo once she pays off the mortgage and forks over the fat real estate fees.

Listing information reveals that the 2-story, top floor condo has honey colored wood floors and a small but airy, double height living room with a fireplace that helps take the chill of those frequently foggy coastal mornings and evenings. The living room has been furnished with a clean-lined sofa and matching chair covered in soft black fabric, a bunch of black throw pillows imprinted with a white skull that Your Mama might cotton to in the right decorative situation, a fuzzy, black area rug that looks like it would be murder to vacuum, a black crystal chandelier (which we confess to coveting because it would look a-may-zing in Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter's dining room), a glossy grand piano, a number of other glossy black pieces of furniture and even more glossy black knick-knacks and candlesticks. The living room appears to be short a coffee table and Your Mama wonders where in the world we'd set a sweating tumbler of gin and tonic if we were ever to pop over to Miss Madison's condo for six or seven cocktails.

The wee kitchen, which unfortunately does double duty as the foyer, has some dark taupe cabinetry, high grade Caesarstone counter tops and a full suite of stainless steel appliances. Adjacent and open to the living room is the condo's second bedroom. Although Your Mama would recommend using it as a dining room because there really isn't any other place to put a table and it opens to a small terrace for summertime grillin' and chillin', we haven't an iota as to how Miss Madison uses the room. Listing photos do show that she keeps a directors chair with her name on it in there as well as a small Warhol-esque portrait painting of Marilyn Monroe and another larger painting depicting, we think, Greta Garbo...or maybe it's Marlene Dietrich or maybe it's someone else, we don't know. Whatever the case, it's gives Your Mama the goose bumps, but not in a good way.

Located at the top of a winding spiral staircase that would make Your Mama woozy under the most sober of circumstances is Miss Madison's boo-dwar. We can't fathom how the big, burly mover men managed to get furniture up that tightly corkscrewed stair, but get furniture up their they did. At the top of the staircase, which has been painted a lovely shade of prison cell gray, is a dressing area with a wall of closets that appears to be open to the living room below. This is a lovely and airy set up if you are home alone but not so much if you have guests sitting on the sofa imbibing booze and nibbling crudités who will too easily be able to hear you fart, belch, chastise your make up gurl or say something catty to your beautician about their tacky outfit and cheap shooz. The bedroom area opens to a private balcony with nice views over the roof tops and through the palm trees that line the streets of Santa Monica and there is a small but adequate private pooper with a lot of dark taupe colored tiles and wood identical to the dark taupe color in the kitchen.

Now then, let's discuss Miss Madison's black satin sheets, shall we? Holly...hunny, no. Never. Ever. We will reluctantly tolerate the eggplant colored wall and we'll allow you to keep the pair of disco ball table lamps on either side of the bed and we'll even permit you that rainbow colored faux-Warholian portrait of Marilyn Monroe if you stamp your little feet and cry a little, but we are drawing the line at black satin sheets. Larhd have mercy, pleeze. No. Listen to Your Mama on this one child: No. In fact, we're going to make this Your Mama's decorating rule #1043 which will hereon and forever declare, "No person of any sexual proclivity, identity, preference and/or gender orientation who claims any sense of decorative taste or decorum will fit their bed or any other bed with black satin sheets for any reason except, maybe, possibly, in the service of dressing the set of a low budget, retro-themed porno movie shoot."

Other features of the newly built condo are the location–just a mile or so from the ocean, the secured two-car side by side parking, the alarm system and video intercom for scoping out whomever might be buzzing the bell, and a key-fob building entry, whatever that is.

It's unclear to Your Mama–not to mention none of our nosy beeswax–why Miss Madison would choose to sell her Santa Monica condo at such a steep and terrifying financial loss. Maybe she wants something in Las Vegas where she seems to be making quite the name for herself. Or maybe she'd rather have a big house in the San Fernando Valley like her former Playboy Mansion sister-wife Bridgit Marquardt who recently snatched up a newly built, five bedroom mock-Mediterranean number in Sherman Oaks. Whatever her reasons, she's definitely looking for a new start because not only is she willing to sell her condo crib at a considerable loss, listing information indicates Miss Madison's furniture can be negotiated with the sale.

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

Jean Harlow, mamma. It's Jean Harlow.

This sad place almost makes me feel sorry for Holly. Almost.

Anonymous said...

Maybe the lowered sales price is to offset the buyer's costs to sterilize everything in the apartment after the property is sold. The decorating is a refined as Holly is.

Anonymous said...

I marvel, Mama, that you would waste your great literary talents on this person or this abode. Neither seems worthy of your attention.

Anonymous said...

Clearly Hef paid cash for it on her behalf. So $700k is $700k more than she had before.

angie said...

Not feeling this place at all, but I blame the architect. A double duty kitchen/entry foyer, a bedroom which would function more practically and necessarily as a dining room, and a 2nd bedroom's dressing area and closets open to the living room? The building's exterior looks rather strange too, echoing a modern jailhouse or prison. Everything about this place seems off and architecturally disjointed to me in one way or another. The decor is the least of it's problems imho, no thank you.

Your writing on the other hand is in top form Mama!

Anonymous said...

It must be a slow day in Real Estate news to post this sad place.

Raina Cox said...

I've always wondered who furnishes their homes from Z Gallerie.

Anonymous said...

I hope she is saving money, making alternative career plans and/or marries well. Life is not always kind to this type of entertainer when the fortieth birthday arrives.

700K buys a nice Las Vegas home.

Anonymous said...

Oh Mama, you are making me snort Pepsi through my nose tonight. Only you could take such a mundane, sad little abode, and make me laugh my head off at your humorous description.

Lola said...

So she bought the apartment in August of 2008 and put it back on the market in June of 2008? I don't get it.

Ernesto said...

I think this is a cute apartment for someone young and single. Not much character, but I love the black chandelier. One last word...if you are going to photograph your bathroom, then fold the towels nicely and get rid of all the products on display!

Anonymous said...

I just can't understand how a realtor would allow pictures like the bathroom with all her "lady things" stacked on the toilet tank, sink shelf and in the tub area and a stinky old towel hangin there.

The little patio: INVEST in some plants and a cozy chair/table set. What.... can't afford $100 to make that sad little lanai something desirable?

The whole apartment reeks of desparation. But nothing a smart gay decorator and some plastic at Crate&Barrell couldn't fix.

Anonymous said...

The remaining units on the same floor that haven't sold yet (brand new) have the same list price.

Madam Pince said...

I could like this place after I tore out those hideous kitchen cabinets and eradicated that eggplant accent wall. The outer design is nothing if not interesting. And I agree with Anon Anon that old man Hef paid for this pad.

Juicy said...

That condo has about as much personality as she does. None.

Anonymous said...

She won't get anywhere close to $700k for this. Unless some deranged fan comes knocking...

Anonymous said...

Holly close your legs I can smell old man Hugh Heffner from here.

NewYorkQueer said...

I have always believed in payment for services rendered, but Mama if all this gurl got for rubbing up against that sagging wrinkled smelly old man, then she needs a few lessons in self valuation. How many years in that worn out tired playboy mansion, a 12 year old boys fantasy of sophistication and sex, how many meals with the other gurls all waiting for Hefs viagra to kick in and all she got was a tacky box condo worth 700k. This gurl needs a new pimp and I would like to say that I am available, a buisness man and gay, so money can be made....finally. It is a sad thing when a kept person of either sex hasnt gotten the goods.

lil' gay boy said...

Tragic; just, well, tragic.

Is this an annex of Valley State Women's Prison or is Hell full & the dead residing in Santa Monica?

Anonymous said...

This place does has a whiff of sadness about it. It looks like a crash or tryst pad, not a place someone actually lives in. I agree it wouldn't be a bad place for a first-time single homebuyer or a couple. I really like Santa Monica. Mmmmm....Broadway Deli...

Unknown said...

Don't yell at me, But I kind of like the place. The kitchen needs to attention, and this girls decorating style, lord have mercy, I have a feeling this child grew up poor and this this her verison of making it.

Still, the condo it self it not bad, nondescript but no bad at the same time.

StPaulSnowman said...

I confess that I never look at the pictures until I read Mama. In this case, I read Mama, glanced at the thumbnails and moved on. Today, I clicked on the photos, and it is seriously bad. Fortunately, I had read the comments beforehand so I had popped some Zofran to protect against the spew. Indeed, a picture is worth a thousand words......even the poor pieano can't make this place look grand. I would feel sorry for this place if it didn't have all its identical siblings around it for self-validation. The blue sky is really beautiful in the first picture.

John M said...

Key-fob meaning that you swipe your key-fob in front of a reader at the door to gain access.

I didn't know that having a keyfob was a marketable selling point these days instead of just drawing attention to the fact that this $700+sqft condo is lacking a proper doorman/security/concierge.

Of course I do have a keyfob myself, I just have not yet to have a chance to use it in the several years of ownership as I live in a properly staffed condominium building.

Anonymous said...
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Unknown said...

My balcony overlooks Playboy Studio’s West and Holly’s condo is just a few blocks down. This is a lower-end industrial Section of Santa Monica and I am shocked she would have purchased here. The developer still has 6 condos left which haven’t sold in the few years they have been on the market.

I kind of question if Holly actually lived here, or used this as a crash pad when she was occasionally working at the studio directing photo shoots.

Just another note, they have a FOR LEASE sign posted on Playboy Studio’s building. I don’t know if they are subleasing a portion or the whole thing. Looks like there are a lot of real estate transitions associated with Playboy or their “employees” these days.

trudysmom said...

Mama, I love your column. I not sure if you are aware, this neighborhood leaves a bit to be desired. I know I live not very far away. Who knew a bunny was living down the street! Sort of...

Babe Parish said...

this motif is what is known as Stripper Chic.

Anonymous said...

that is a tacky tacky place,

I cannot believe they did bother to clean up before taking the pictures. the bathroom is nasty,no excuse for the filth & we are talking about 700K, that is a mansion in many nice cities.

It would be easy to fix it up cute

Virgtastic said...

Black chandelier - love.