Ellen DeGeneres’s house is on the market: Take a peep inside
Daytime talk show host Ellen DeGeneres and her wife, Arrested Development star Portia de Rossi, are selling their hilltop Montecito oasis for $39.9 million. The couple purchased the home in early 2019 for $27 million. They expanded the complex by purchasing adjoining property for $1.9 million and modernized it with various design and building upgrades.
Salt Hill home
Ellen DeGeneres & Portia de Rossi’s gated estate, nicknamed Salt Hill, is a total of 9.3 acres and approximately 10,700 square feet. There are five bedrooms total with five full bathrooms & five half baths. The compound includes a cabana with a gym, a Koi pond, a pickleball court, and an infinity pool that overlooks the Pacific Ocean.
According to Variety, Salt Hill also includes a security office for a full-time bodyguard. After an alleged “inside” burglary in the summer of 2020, the complex’s security system underwent a full security upgrade including high-tech cameras and infrared lasers. (Now that’s luxury!)
With acres of native plants, sculptures, ancient oaks, exotic gardens, banana plants, and hundreds of old trees, this Bali-inspired estate sounds like it will make you feel like you are halfway across the world. The interiors of the compound have a Southeast Asian style as well. (Sounds like a pretty relaxing place to quarantine, unless you’re going through a public scandal, then it probably doesn’t really matter where you are.)
According to realtor.com, the main house of the compound opens onto a veranda with a dining area, seating, and a fire pit with a view of the infinity pool & the ocean. The home contains warm woods, bamboo ceilings and walls of glass. The remodeled chef’s kitchen features blackstone counters and open shelves. There is a library that contains built-in bookshelves and clerestory windows. (Do you think they have Harry Potter books?)
Montecito
Salt Hill isn’t the first home Ellen DeGeneres & Portia de Rossi have purchased in Montecito. The famous couple owned multiple properties in the sleepy California neighborhood, dubbed one of the wealthiest communities in the United States.
Montecito, meaning “little mountain” in Spanish, is just east of Santa Barbara. According to compass.com, it’s eight square miles are built into the oak and eucalyptus-laden foothills of the Santa Ynez mountains.
The luxurious, seaside town is home to many other A-list celebrities including Oprah Winfrey, Brad Pitt, and Prince Harry & Megan Markle. Montecito is a peaceful, seaside oasis that contains world-class resorts, topnotch schools, lavish country clubs, luxury shopping, and fine-dining. (We may dream big, but this place feels a bit unrealistic.)
Flipping houses
Besides showbiz, Ellen DeGeneres & Portia de Rossi are known for flipping houses. The celebrity couple rarely keeps any of their properties for over two years. Instead, they opt for renovating these million-dollar houses and with the help of real estate specialists, flip them, and gain a massive profit.
According to Architectural Digest, when Ellen DeGeneres started making money, the first thing she did was buy a home. That home, a Spanish bungalow in West Hollywood, was DeGeneres’s first experience flipping a house. In a 2015 interview with the Los Angeles Times, she said, “I fixed it up and later sold it”. . . “That was when I realized that if you make some improvements, you can make money.”
Although Ellen DeGeneres is a master house flipper, in 2014 she told The New York Times, “I’ve never bought to sell. I always say, ‘This is it. I’m never moving’. . . People laugh at me now.”
On The Today Show in 2018, Ellen DeGeneres said, “We buy a house and we love it, and we stay in it. Then we get a little bored because we like a different style or different aesthetic, and I love furniture and decorating, so if I find something else, and we make money, why not move to another house?”
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If you had an extra $40 million lying around, would you buy this house? Let us know!
