Jeff Bezos buys Beverly Hills mansion for a record $165m

The iconic nine-acre property was designed for Hollywood film titan Jack Warner in the 1930s

CEO of Amazon Jeff Bezos (R) and his girlfriend Lauren Sanchez (L) pose for pictures as they arrive to attend an event in Mumbai on January 16, 2020.  / AFP / Sujit Jaiswal
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Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest person, reportedly paid $165 million (Dh606m) for a nine-acre historic Beverly Hills mansion, setting a record for a Los Angeles-area home.

Mr Bezos bought the property from billionaire DreamWorks co-founder David Geffen, who had bought it for $47.5m in 1990, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

The estate was designed for the late Hollywood film titan Jack Warner – of Warner Brothers fame – in the 1930s. A 1992 Architectural Digest article described it as "the archetypal studio mogul's estate" with its 1,260-square-metre Georgian-style mansion, expansive terraces and gardens, tennis court, swimming pool, two guesthouses and a nine-hole golf course.

The purchase surpasses the previous Los Angeles County record set late last year by News Corporation heir Lachlan Murdoch, who paid $150m for the Bel Air estate that had been featured on “The Beverly Hillbillies” TV show.

It is also the second-biggest US transaction recorded, behind Citadel founder Ken Griffin's $238m New York penthouse purchase in January of last year.

In addition to the Warner estate, Bezos Expeditions, an umbrella company that manages Mr Bezos's personal investments, paid $90m for an undeveloped plot of land from the estate of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, the WSJ said. Earlier this year, Mr Bezos purchased three New York apartments in a deal valued at around $80m.

The real estate splurge come as Mr Bezos cashed out 2 million Amazon shares, worth $4.1bn, as part of a pre-arranged trading plan between January 31 and February 6, according to regulatory filings.

Bezos’s real-estate empire already features homes on both US coasts, including a Washington, DC mansion where he recently hosted a party for capital elite including Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump.

Despite his divorce last year, Mr Bezos, 56, is worth an estimated $131.3 billion, according to Forbes.