Expensive Celebrity Homes

The elegant homes of the celebrities include all the world-class amenities which one can only dream off.  From high-end mansions to luxury apartments, celebrities are spending millions to call these places as their home. These luxurious mansions are iconic and exemplary in their own way; they are also the perfect fusion of ‘Comfort and Luxury.’

1) Oprah Winfrey:

Valued at: $85 million

Oprah Winfrey, famously known for her women-empowering show, ‘Oprah,’ lives in one of the most expensive as well as amazing homes in the world. Her exclusive California estate was brought in the year 2001 for a whopping $55 million and since then the price of the Montecito estate has only increased. According to sources, the house is worth $85 million now. Her lavish home is lovingly called ‘Oasis,’ which is of 23,000 square feet in area. Winfrey’s home includes some attractive views along with lush gardens, gourmet kitchen, six bedrooms, a theatre, 14 bathrooms ,fire places and man-made lake filled with exotic fishes. This palatial house has a ‘garden teahouse’ which is one of the most attractive part that distinguishes this house from the others. To Winfrey, her home reflects her personality and also how she grew up, reports Sumitra Nair, Luxpresso.

2) Hugh Hefner:

Valued at – $54 Million

Hugh Hefner’s extravagant ‘Playboy Mansion’ is as impressive as its owner. This $54 million home is located in Holmby Hills in Los Angeles, California. This lavish ‘Playboy Mansion’ spreads over 21,987 square feet and was designed by the architect, Arthur R. Kelly, back in the year 1927. Hefner’s palatial abode features 22 rooms, swimming pool area with – bathhouse, sauna and grotto, waterfall, tennis courts, zoo and aviary (with a pet cemetery), game room, wine cellar and the famous yet elusive ‘Elvis Suite.’

3) Billy Joel:

Valued at- $35 million

Singer Billy Joel’s beach house is perhaps the hottest place to live. This uptown home is worth $35 million and spans over an area of 303,310 square feet. This house is located in La Gorce Island in Miami Beach, Florida. This beach facing stylish house is made up of materials like glass, stone and onyx. Also, this house is famous for onyx-studded bathrooms and a fireplace, which is hand-carved. Joel’s lavish house offers breathtaking views of the beach, which makes it the most exotic.

4) Jerry Sienfeld:

Valued at – $32 Million

Jerry Sienfeld, the famous stand-up comedian and wife Jessica bought singer Billy Joels’ home for whopping $32 million. This house is situated in The Hamptons (East), New York. This expensive property spans over 12 acres of land and features some interesting entities. It is renowned for its one-of-a-kind baseball field. This lavish house includes 22 garages, den, nursery room and playroom. This water-front house of Seinfeld also has a guesthouse and a pool. In the year 2007, OK magazine called his house the “best partying house in the Hamptons.”

5) Arnold Schwarzenegger:

Valued at-$23.5 million

Hollywood’s action hero, Arnold Schwarzenegger and his ex-wife Maria Shriver had a very lovely home in Brentwood County, California. This extravagant home was bought for a whopping of $18 million in 2003, and since then, the value of the property has only appreciated. Apparently worth $23.5 million now, this house is spread over 2.5 acres of land or over 14,500 square feet. This palatial abode features around 10 bathrooms, 7 bedrooms, tennis court, spa, a pool and duck pond with natural stream. This house has a Mediterranean-style compound and a full-sized guest house and also been said that the house is “totally private and secluded.” This former couple’s home was also on the list of ‘elite homes on sale.’

6) Will Smith:

Valued at-$20 million

Hollywood celebrity couple Will and Jada Pinkett Smith’s dream house in California is one of the most spacious as well as expensive. Smith lovingly calls their house as ‘Calabasas Castle.’ This house is located in Santa Monica Mountains, Calabasas, California. The couple’s palatial house is so big that sometimes it jokingly said that it has its own zip code – the American version of our pin codes. This residential property spans over 63 acres of land and occupies an area of 11,000 square feet. Calabasas Castle has few distinct features such as a bar in every room of the house, golf course, tennis court, basketball court, a huge swimming pool and a man-made lake.

7) Shah Rukh Khan:

Valued At- 17.84 crore (approx)

Bollywood star Shahrukh Khan may have one spacious abode in Mumbai, but this doesn’t stop him from being the proud owner of a Signature Villa on ‘The Palm Jumeirah’ worth 17.84 crore. This expensive house, he claims it as a gift for his endorsement of the ‘The Palm Jumeirah,’ the man-made Island. This house features six bedrooms, two remote control car garages, a swimming pool and private access to the beach. This lavish villa in Dubai spreads over 8500 square feet and occupies 14000 square feet of plots. Khan likes to visit this villa with his family as the place provides privacy for his family.

8) Pink:

Valued At- $11.8 million

Singer Pink and her husband Carey Hart invested on a Malibu Mansion for $11.8 million, the time when the couple was expecting their first baby. This beautiful mansion is located in Malibu, California and spreads over 6800 square foot. This lavish property is near to the coastline and has six bedrooms, seven bathrooms, a large swimming pool and five garages.

9) Jay Z and Beyonce:

Valued at-$20 million

This couple has a beautiful lavish home on a private island worth $20 million. The same island which singer Jay z gifted his pretty wife Beyonce on her 29^th birthday. This private island is located off-shore Florida and spreads over 12.5 acres of land. This expensive house features world-class amenities and offers breathtaking views of the landscape.

10) Salman Khan:

Valued at- 32 crore

Bollywood actor Salman Khan has recently invested on a triplex worth 32 crore, which is near to Shahrukh Khan’s house Mannat. Apparently, he has not shifted to his new home on a 28-storey building named ‘The Adress,’ which is also near to this current home at Galaxy apartments. This property spreads over 9763 square feet of area and is still under construction, according to sources.

India has More to it than Poverty, Feels Oprah Winfrey

The traffic manners may have left her aghast, but the world’s most celebrated talk show host Oprah Winfrey says she was impressed by India‘s “glorious” family tradition and would love to return to the country which had much more to it than filth and poverty.

“What most impressed me here was the family tradition in the country and the fact that you take care of your parents, your grandparents,” said the 57-year-old media moghul, who turned up at the Jaipur Literary Festival wearing a yellow-green embroidered salwar paired with ankle grazing western styled pyjamas.

Her first visit to India, she said, was driven by her first image of the country – a picture featuring a woman on a camel – which she put on her visit board reading ‘Come to India’.

And after witnessing first hand the “paradox” that is India, and being left “awestruck” by the traffic manners of the country, she would definitely like to return, she said.

“Having been to a family of four generations, I got a sense of how glorious it is,” she said.

The media moghul spent time in Mumbai, visiting a slum, an ashram for widows, besides attending a high-profile dinner with Bollywood personalities before coming to Jaipur.

While she got a glimpse of both the extremes of India, she said, she would like to portray the country as a whole and not “just show the filth”.

“It was important to go to slums but not necessary to show the the worst of the worst, what I wanted to portray is that there is poverty but there is still a sense of hope,” she said.

And while she was much impressed by many things in India, traffic manners was not one of them.

“What is it with the red lights here. Is it there just for your entertainment? she asked to bursts of laughter from the audience.

“There is a red light on and everybody just keeps going,” she said.

And she returned to the subject before finishing her talk. “Texting while driving is stupid. But in India it is insane,” she said, tongue in cheek.

Oprah’s meeting with the widows too left her quite moved and according to her “caused a shift in my consciousness”.

She said she was all the more surprised by the fact that women who lose their husbands can be discarded in a country where families do so well to take care of their elders.

“I couldn’t understand this paradox that a country where families have so much love for their elders could discard its women just because they did not have husbands,” she said.
Source: PTI

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Celebrities, What They Did Before?

We all have seen the celebs as the star icons. We might think they are very lucky to be there and enjoy their luxurious life. But do you have any idea what were they doing before gaining the stardom? Well the answers for this might surprise you. Many celebs have done those kinds of jobs which you would not even have imagined before.

Here are the five top celebrities who pursued different careers before becoming Superstars worldwide:

Rajinikanth- Superstar Rajinikanth was born and brought up in Bangalore before he joined the Tamil film industry and became a superstar. He did his elementary education in Kannada at the Government Model Primary School in Bangalore.

During 1966 and 1973 he worked in many places of Chennai and Bangalore. He did various jobs before he joined as a bus conductor in the Bangalore Transport Service, in Bangalore. In 1975 he began his career as an actor in the Tamil film industry through the film “Apporva Ragangal”, which was directed by his mentor K.Balachander.

Akshay Kumar-

Action Star Akshay Kumar was born and brought up in Amritsar, Punjab. He did all kinds of odd jobs before he came into the Hindi film industry. He obtained a black belt in Taekwondo in India and he studied martial arts in Bangkok, Thailand where he learned Muay Thai. During his stay in Bangkok, he worked as a chef and waiter in a restaurant.

He debuted to the Hindi film industry in the year 1991 with the film Saugandh.

Oprah Winfrey

Oprah Winfrey, an American media proprietor, business woman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist. She is best known for her self-titled, multi-award-winning talk show “The Oprah Winfrey Show”.

Before Oprah became a successful host, her first job was at a local grocery store. Later she had worked in a local radio station WVOL. She had worked there during her senior year of high school and again while in her first two years of college.

Tom Cruise

Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, an American film actor and producer had joined Franciscan Seminary in Cincinnati where he had aspired to become a Catholic priest. In his senior year, he played football for the varsity team as a linebacker.

Cruise started his film career in the year 1981 with the films Endless Love and Taps, where he acted in a supporting role. Cruise first debuted in a major film called “The Outsider” which was directed by Francis Ford Coppola in the year 1983. His first leading role was in the film “Risky Business”.

Brad Pitt

While his stay in Los Angeles, Brad was struggling to establish himself. During his stay there, Brad took lessons from acting coach Roy London. He took on various jobs, spending time as a chauffeur and he also worked for El Pollo Loco restaurant, on sunset Boulevard for dressing up like a chicken to pay for his acting lessons.

Later, Pitt began his onscreen career began in 1987, with uncredited parts in the films No Way Out, No Mans Land and Less Than Zero. And then Pitt began his television debut in the same year with a guest appearance in the CBS prime-time soap opera Dallas.

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