Your Mama Hears...

...from Candy Catoutofthebag that the pending civil trial brought against Beverly Hills real estate agent Josh Flagg for an alleged art heist has been put on hold to make way for an investigation by the City Attorney and the FBI. That's right, the FBI. Your Mama did a little investigation of our own and managed to get the rumor affirmed by someone other that Miss Catoutofthebag who sits close to the situation and requested anonymity.

The children will recall that young, scruffy and heavy-lidded Mister Flagg, who appeared on the second season of the Bravo's real estate train wreck Million Dollar Listing, was accused of and publicly pilloried for allegedly stealing expensive artwork right out of a dee-luxe property owned by the estate of Marcia Israel that he had been hired to list and sale.

Certain items belonging to the estate–reported to include Jade sculptures and paintings by Marc Chagall and Pablo Picasso–were indeed found in Mister Flagg's possession and in fact several of the object in questions were reportedly photographed by an investigator through the windows of Mister Flagg's Beverly Hills abode. At least some if not all of the artwork found in Mister Flagg's possession have been returned to the estate of Miz Israel. Interstingly, at the time of his arrest Mister Flagg's attorney claimed there was nothing to be done about the matter because any statute of limitations had done run out. Of course, we do not know a law book from a recipe but that does not sound to Your Mama like he was claiming his client is innocent.

Marcia Israel was a beloved gal about Beverly Hills who started a Los Angeles based chain of inexpensive clothing stores called Judy's. Miz Israel sold her little retail empire in 1989 for an impressive $32,000,000 to a Hong Kong based operation.

Mister Flagg was released on bail and continues to list pricey properties all over Los Angeles and is currently filming the third season Million Dollar Listing along with his hairtastic nemesis Chad Rogers and Malibu's Madison Hildebrand.

The Sweet Casa of Rachel Sweet

SELLER: Rachel Sweet and Tom Palmer
LOCATION: N. Cockerham Avenue, Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $9,995,000
SIZE: 6,205 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 5.5 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: Los Pavoreales, 1926 by Wallace Neff. Spectacular Celebrity compound with star-studded provenance. Long private drive leading to an enormous motor court and grand entry. The public rooms are renowned for their grand scale as is the truly impressive master bedroom with period bathroom, 2 junior bedroom suites, and family room. The grounds feature rolling lawns, play house, and and ascending garden with spectacular city views. The detached guest house has two bedrooms, 2 baths and a kitchen.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Dotted around the hills, flats and rugged canyons of Los Angeles are a a number of primo and pricey properties that are often (and usually) passed from one celebrity to another. Once such property is Los Pavoreales, the Los Feliz compound currently owned by singer turned actress turned boob toob producer Rachel Sweet and her man-mate Tom Palmer who recently hoisted their hacienda style home on the market with an asking price of $9,995,000.

Your Mama realizes that few of the children will know a damn thing about Miss Sweet so we're going to provide y'all with a brief (and incomplete) synopsis of her life in the entertainment bizness. Miss Sweet got her celebrity wings in the mid-1970s as a not particularly successful 12-year old country music crooner but quickly switched to pop music in the late 1970s. The Ohio born gal wasn't much of a mainstream hit in the music world but she did earn some attention for her teenage tart image which was far more shocking back in 1980 than it is today when 13- and 15-year old wannabe starlets are regularly seen teetering around town in towering heels and frightfully low cut dresses that barely hide their mosquite bite boobies.

Anyhoo, in the late 1980s young Miss Sweet had a very short lived (but cult hit) program called The Sweet Life. She also wrote and sang the title song for 1988s Hairspray, John Water's high-larious entree into mainstream movie making. (That would be the first and better Hairspray, the one with the dee-voon Divine, not the more sanitized remake with heterosexual actor John Travolta working his drag as Edna Turnblad.) In the 1990s, Miss Sweet wrote a number of songs for Mister Waters' Cry Baby and scored a bunch of itty-bitty roles on boob-toob programs like Seinfeld until the late 1990s when she switched to writing and producing successful sitcoms. Her credits include producing Sports Night, writing and executive producing Dharma & Greg, and writing and executive producing George Lopez, a program we think is about as funny as a cardiac arrest but makes Your Mama's big daddy laugh and laugh and laugh.

Now then, let's get back to the real estate. Property records reveal that Miss Sweet's Spanish style manse on N. Cockerham Avenue (which records also show as having a N. Vermont Avenue address) was designed by eminent architect Wallace Neff in 1926. Your Mama is not sure who inhabited the house after it was built but we do know that in August of 1996 Kaballah Kween Madonna Ciccone purchased the property for $2,690,000. The Kaballah Kween owned the property until November of 2000 when she sold to known Scientologists Bodhi and Jenna Elfman (Dharma & Greg) for an even-steven $4,000,000. In 2003, the peeps at People revealed that when K.K. sold the house to the Elmans there was no central air-conditioning system (which must have been murder on her hair) nor was there a sprinkler system. Apparently, rather than install sprinklers, K.K. just hired someone to hand water the damn lawns. Your Mama can only hope both of those issues have since been corrected because come August it is hot in Los Feliz and for ten million clams we do not want to spend the afternoon sweating like a sow in the sun.

As far as Your Mama can tell from our research on the interweb, Mister and Missus Elfman owned the house until April of 2004 when they sold it for $4,700,000 to the spectacular actress Katey Sagal (Married With Children, Furturama, 8 Simple Rules) and her doll fearing writer/producer huzband Kurt Sutter. The Sagal/Sutters only owned the house until August of 2005 when they reportedly sold it for $5,510,000 to our Miss Sweet and her man-mate Tom Palmer.

Somewhere along the way, perhaps even by Mister Neff himself, the wonderfully private 1.81-acre property was given the name Los Pavoreales, which as best as Your Mama's barely bilingual brain can figure translates to The Peacocks. Property records show the Sweet casa measures 6,205 square feet with 3 bedrooms and 6 poopers. However, listing information indicates there are 5 bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms. We're not sure why the discrepancy but it may or may not have something to do with the detached 2 bedroom and 2 terlit guest house.

The imposing but not pretty front gate opens to a long curving drive that gently rises to a massive motor court with the guest house on the left and the entrance to the main house on the right. For the record, Your Mama thinks the motor court could use a fresh paving, but that's none of our beeswax and we digress. Slim brick paths pass under some pretty shade trees and lead to a brick courtyard big enough to host a hoe-down and the formidable front door. The public rooms include a leviathan living room with a fireplace and wood floors and a tile floored and banquet hall sized dining room both with very high and intricately beamed ceilings. Beyond the living room is an all red room with a fireplace and peaked wood ceiling which listing information refers to as the library/study. All three of the rooms show a remarkable restraint in the day-core which has created a sort of maximal minimalism.

The kitchen has retained its original honey-comb shaped saltillo tile floor but has been kitted out with new fangled stainless steel cabinetry and counter tops that would make our housegurl Svetlana's hair stand on end. The work island, lit by two pineapple shape fixtures, includes a convenient vegetable sink and a dark and dee-lishus wood counter top (perhaps it's teak?) which along with the floor manages to keep this surgical suite-ish kitchen from feeling like, well, a surgical suite or the back room of a butcher shop. An adjacent family room features a third fireplace (there are three according to listing information) with a flat screen tee-vee mounted above the minimal fireplace surround, a couple of vintage looking iron chandeliers and a pair of arched doorways filled with spectacular iron and glass doors that pivot open to the yard.

The grounds includes a commodious covered patio with a complicated paint scheme on the beams, long stretches of lawn that roll and slope down the hill towards the front of the property and at the back, up the not particularly well cared for terraces that climb up the hillside, a simply shaped shingled play house sits on a cantilevered platform. What the property does not include is a swimming pool or a tennis court and while we may in the minority here, Your Mama wants both of these things in a ten million dollar house.

Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter wait patiently to see who buys this piece of celebrity real estate history and we wish Miss Sweet and her huzband happy trails.

The Nashville Mansion of Steve McNair (May He Rest In Peace)

SELLER: Steve and Mechelle McNair
LOCATION: Bear Road, Nashville, TN
PRICE: $2,999,990
SIZE: 14,263 square feet, 9 bedrooms, 9.5 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: n/a

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: It's been a ka-ray-zee couple of weeks for famous folks dying off or getting themselves killed under suspicious circumstances. There was, among others, Charlie's Angels' Farrah Fawcett and avant garde choreographer Pina Bausch who were both taken out by cancer as well as Academy Award winning actor Karl Malden and the dee-voon Mollie Sugden who died of being old. Then there was Michael "The White Lady" Jackson who perished for as yet unknown (but fishy sounding) reasons in his rented Holmby Hills mansion and most recently professional pig skinner Steve McNair was found dead of multiple gunshots wounds in a downtown Nashville condominium along with a 20-year of gurl, also dead, who is believed to have been the very married Mister McNair's gal pal.

Of course, Your Mama don't know nuthin' from a dead mackerel about professional football so we took to the internets to suss out some information about Mister McNair. From what we dug up Your Mama thinks it's a real damn pity this man's legacy is going to go down with him being murdered while in the company of his much younger extramarital gurlfriend because by all accounts Mister NcNair, who was oft called Air McNair, was a crack quarterback who spent ten successful seasons with the Tennessee Titans before being shuffled off to the Baltimore Ravens in 2006. Mister McNair used some of his riches to fund a foundation focused on doing good things for young people.

Anyhoo, according to loads of previous reports (and about twelve welcome emails from folks down Tennesee way), Mister McNair and his ladee-wifey Mechelle had previously listed their big ol' Nashville mansion which currently carries an ass-wonky asking price of $2,999,990. Lard children, why do some of these real estate people slap these crazy numbers on properties? Why not just call it three million? Seriously, why? Pleeze.

The McNair's brick built behemoth is what builders and real estate people sometimes call "Transitional" style. "Transitional" homes are meant to be a mixtures of traditional and contemporary styles. However, what that term suggests to Your Mama and a gazillions other architectural dee-zine snobs is a house of no particular architectural style or value. In the McNair's case we get a brick built and hodge-podged unholy hot mess of clickety-clack residential design littered with odd proportions, low ceilings, big bay windows and nearly a dozen dog house dormers that altogether give it a look of a suburban office building where Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter might get our chompers worked on iffin we lived in Arlington, VA. And that's just the exterior.

Let's do the numbers on this one children. Listing information and property records reveal that Mister and Missus McNair paid $1,599,000 for their Bear Road residence which sits on a 1.33 acre corner lot and in an area called the Woodmont Estates measures in at 14,263 square feet. There are, according to listing information, 26 rooms spread across two floors (plus a small basement) with 9 bedrooms and 9.5 poopers which surely kept Missus McNair bizzy bossing the minimum wage gurls charged with keeping the floors Swiffered and the terlits sparkling.

In addition to all the "formal" rooms, the McNair mansion also includes an almost countless number of secondary living and entertaining areas throughout the rambling u-shaped house including a movie thee-ay-ter, family room, recreation room, hobby room, several sitting rooms on the second floor, and a 54-foot long room above the 3-car garage that includes nearly an acre of light beige wall to wall, a peaked and sky lit ceiling, a grand piano and some swoopy faux-Louis-like chairs and sofas.

Listen puppies, it's not that Your Mama does not have anything to say about the disastrous day-core of the McNair mansion. Oh no, we do. We could most certainly go a blue streak about the peacock feathers in the dining room and all the wrought iron this and thats not to mention the obscene white sofa things in the master bedroom that make Your Mama's eyes roll right back in our head. However, although Your Mama's momma and her sister-pal Jennie spent many of the weekends of our rebellious youth nursing a bottomless box of blush wine, we were none the less raised up right. So we know it is not proper to speak ill of the day-core of the recently dead, particularly that of those who left this world under sordid or tragic circumstances.

The property is fully fenced with two drive gates connected by an arched driveway and a couple of parking pads. Due to its location on a corner and no doubt due to required set backs, the property is almost all front yard with just a small-ish back yard tucked into the back of the house where there is a rectangular swimming pool, a raised stone spa and a lot of concrete patio space for grillin' and chillin' with friends and family.

According to previous reports and property records, Mister and Missus McNair also have a big farm on the eponymous Air McNair Road in rural Collins, Mississippi which appears to Your Mama to be about 40 or 50 miles from Jackson, the Magnolia State capital.

In all seriousness, Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter both wish Missus McNair and her children the courage for fortitude to deal with what is clearly a very complicated and calamitous situation.

Your Mama Hears...

...from a woman we'll call Wendy Windbag that word on the Westchester County real estate gossip grapevine is that political power pair Bill and Hillary Clinton might soon have some property news to announce.

There have already been many rumors and multiple reports that Bill and Hill have been house hunting in Westchester County and some reports say they also peeped at a property just outside hippy-dippy and world famous Woodstock, NY in upstate New York.

We know nothing about the Demo duo shopping for a hideway in upstate New York, but according to Miss Windbag, the ex-President and current Secretary of State have made an offer on a new primary residence in Westchester County. Unfortunately, that's all the 411 Miss Windbag would reveal to Your Mama at this time but earlier reports indicate they want something bigger where they will be more comfortable entertaining.

When in Washington D.C., where Hill spends most of her time sans Bill, the former first couple shack up in a pretty brick Georgian number on Whitehaven Street NW and when in Chappaqua–that's in Westchester Country puppies, where Bill spends most of his time sans Hill, the Clintons own a 5 bedroom house on Old House Lane they scooped up in 1999 for $1,700,000.

UPDATE: Michael Jackson

Hold on to your boots babies because the disturbingly pallid and suspendered tee-vee talking head that is Larry King will be taking viewers on a tour of Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch. Tonight! Nine p.m. Eastern Standard. That's six pee-em for all the west coast children.

He will be joined by Jermaine Jackson and other "close friends." Pleeze jeezis let Lizzie Taylor be there along with the dee-voon Miss Ross, Uri Geller and that Dr. Tohme R. Tohme fellow who is, apparently, not actually a medical doctor of any kind but likes to be referred to as one anyway.

As we mentioned the other day, a little birdie snitched to Your Mama that this shadowy Tohme Tohme person, who was once described as Michael Jackson's manager, is in escrow to buy a big house on Bel Air's Stone Canyon Boulevard.

Now then...Your Mama thinks we've done flooded the damn car. Unless there is something real estate related that our little pea brain declares is vitally important or excessively inneresting, there will be no more discussing Michael Jackson, or as we liked to call him The White Lady. May he and all his wacky ways rest in peace.

We apologize...

...for two reasons.

The first is that we were blocked from posting anything this morning for unknown reasons.

Secondly because it seems that the gossip "media" is all Bernie Madoff and Michael Jackson all the time this last week and while we are considering putting a cork in our big mouth about these two enigmatic men, we haven't yet. So bear with us while we work out our own unnatural and unhealthy fascinations with these two troubled and unsettling souls.

Once upon a time there was a man with the unfortunate name of J. Ezra Merkin. While Merkin may be a perfectly benign (even banal) sounding surname to many, in Your Mama's world a merkin is a wig for the hoo-hoo. That's right, a wig for the hoo-hoo. Most people probably never knew such a doohickey actually existed, but yes chickens, a merkin is indeed a wig for a woman's kitty and can be had for as little at forty bucks at the beauty supply.

But we digress. Although saddled with a name that has surely brought him a few moments of withering ridicule, our Mister Merkin prevailed over that particular patronymic misfortune and became a ferociously rich financier and high-livin' hedge fund manager. In fact, Mister Merkin became so rich that in 1995 he paid billionaire biznessman Ron Perelman eleven million smackers for an 18-room doo-plex at 740 Park Avenue, one of the most restrictive, immoderately expensive and intriguing apartment buildings in all of Manhattan.

Like many hedge hogs and fat cat plutocrats, after making vast sums of money, Mister and Missus Merkin went on to amass a large modern art collection which eventually came to include gorgeously slender Giacometti sculptures and an almost unbelievable 12 Rothkos, constituting what some have said is the largest collection of the painter's work held in private hands.

Then along came big bad Bernie Madoff. By most accounts Mister Merkin funneled a staggering $2.4 billion bucks into Bernie's fraudulent enterprise all of which evaporated in Bernie Madoff's sinister financial wake. Although it's not yet been proven that Mister Merkin knew anything about Bernie's elaborate misdeeds and Mister Merkin, naturally, denies any culpability or knowledge, he is none the less in the firing line of irate investors who claim he lied to them about who exactly was managing their money. In short, they say he told them he was managing the money when, they say, he was actually just handing the money over to Bernie's sinking ship. A civil suit was filed against Mister Merkin in early April of 2009 by New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo who, as part of the ongoing investigation and civil suit, is "forcing" Mister Merkin to sell off his assets with proceeds going to investors whose money was turned over to Bernie Madoff.

Recent reports reveal that Mister Merkin is in the process of selling his art collection, including some or all of those pretty Rothkos that hang around his lavish spread at 740 Park Avenue. The NY Post reports that the sale involves, "10 to 15 pieces, mostly paintings by Rothko" for which an as yet unidentified buyer is said to be forking over a spine tingling $310,000,000. Your Mama likes to imagine that the buyer is one of Mister Merkin's many bizness nemisi who will no doubt derive great pleasure from stripping Mister Merkin of the fruits and spoils of his labor.

However, as much as we like art and modern art in particular, it's Mister Merkin's ritzy real estate holdings that interest Your Mama the most. The NY Post recently reported that in addition to liquidating his artworks, Mister and Missus Merkin are "laying the groundwork" for selling their dee-luxe doo-plex digs at 740 Park Avenue. Of course, upon reading that Your Mama and every other floor plan slut began to sweat with anticipation waiting for the listing to hit the pipeline.

Some reports say the 6th and 7th floor doo-lex could fetch as much at $50,000,000 but that seems rather optimistic to Your Mama given that the most recent sales at 740 Park Avenue include Vera Wang's $23,100,000 purchase of her parents' pad in 2007 and the $27,500,000 sale of Edith Haupt's 2 bedroom doo-plex on the 17th and 18th floors in 2006 to much maligned financier John Thain.

There is currently only one apartment at 740 on the open market and that is a 15-room, spread owned by oil heiress June Speight and her stockbroker huzband Randolph listed at $26,000,000. The 6,700 square foot doo-plex on the 4th and 5th floors has been on the open market for nearly a year and has already had $9,000,000 is price chops. Peter Huang's 4th and 5th floor doo-plex (right next door to the Speights) was listed in July of 2008 for a blistering $38,000,000 but after 5 months it was de-listed amid rumors that it was in contract (it was not according to author Michael Gross who hawk watches and reports on all things 740 Park Avenue). As was widely reported in the New York papers, Courtney Sale Ross' double-dooplex on the 12th and 13th floors (E. 71st Street entrance) may or may not be available for around $60,000,000...or $75,000,000 depending on who you ask.

At any rate, it seems crystal clear that Mister and Missus Merkin will be compelled to sell their 740 Park doo-plex along with whatever other hoity-toity assets Andy Cuomo says must be sold. What remains to be seen is when, for how much, and who will buy such a monstrous crib with a reported $15,000+ per month maintenance at a time when there are fewer and fewer buyers for such massive and massively priced apartments. We shall see children, we shall see. In the meantime be sure to ring Your Mama and let her know if you hear any dish on the doo-plex.

Records show that Mister and Missus Merkin also own a property in near Aspen, CO and a waterfront house on Bay Boulevard in Atlantic Beach that is surprisingly modest for a couple who shack up in one of the most expensive and exclusive buildings in Manhattan.

In other real estate related Madoff news...yesterday Bernie's wife Ruth was officially booted from her East 63rd Street penthouse perch. The U.S. Marshall notified Ruthie of the seizure and she was expected to be "leaving the residence and surrendering all personal property." Your Mama is no attorney so if any of you legal eagles know, what constitutes personal property? Could she take her expensive clothes? Her handbags? Jewelry? Shoes? Anything?

She still has $2.5 million that federal prosecutors have allowed her to keep but that is not protected from any civil suits that might be filed against her. The couple's other properties–in Palm Beach, Montauk and the South of France–were already seized leaving Ruthie with no where to go unless one of her sons or remaining friends takes her in.

UPDATE: Michael Jackson

Lard have mercy Your Mama is ready for all this Michael Jackson madness to come to a swift conclusion. However, in the interest of seeing something through to the bitter end (and, if we may be honest, keeping up with the Jones') we got a bit more 411 on what is to become of the Holmby Hills Estate where Mister Jackson met his untimely if not entirely surprising end.

According to the peeps at gossip juggernaut TMZ, who seem to have a direct line to all things Michael Jackson, the 3-story, 7 bedroom and 13 terlit mansion on N. Carolwood Drive is to be leased to fashion dee-ziner Christian Audigier.

Perhaps not coincidentally, the estate is currently owned by clothing manufacturer Hubert Guez who is, ta-da!, the CEO of Ed Hardy, one of the several flashy brands created by Mister Audigier. Apparently Mister Audigier is going to move his offices into the building. Your Mama hopes the property is zoned for business.

No word on what Mister Audigier will be paying (and frankly we do not care a lick), but it has been widely reported that Mister Jackson was paying a breath taking $100,000 per month. Maybe he expired after getting the rent bill.