Today is Nic Cage Day across the Curbediverse, a day for celebrating The Legend and his legendary real estate hijinks. Why? Because Nic Cage.
As a consumer of real estate, Nicolas Cage can be diplomatically described as arduous. As our coconspirators at Curbed National tell it, Cage has, at one point or another, let tens of millions of dollars worth of homes slip through his eyeball-fisting and/or compulsively snapping fingers, from a $25 million Newport Beach mansion with a yacht dock to a 1928 castle-style abode in the hills of Los Angeles with purple velvet wall coverings. But not all of these, er, investments turned out so well. Between 2007 and 2009, financial miscalculations, tax debts, and a freefalling housing market cost him almost every one of his homes and a big chunk of his fortune. It was during that time, of course, that Cage spent a brief spell as a homeowner in Russian Hill.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Messr. Cage picked up the six-bedroom Gothic Tudor mansion at 898 Francisco Street in Russian Hill in September 2006. He paid $9.4 million for the house and an adjacent vacant lot. Built in 1914, the home features a wrought-iron gate topped by a serious-looking cross, boasts Golden Gate views, and comes with a master suite featuring two dressing rooms, along with a sad, linoleum-plagued kitchen.
But—you know where this is going—before any plans materialized for the home and its land, Cage seemed to reverse course. By April, the property was back on the market for the same $9.4 million, until it disappeared again. We can't know what happened in the intervening time, but before long a forlorn, unstaged 898 Francisco appeared on the MLS seeking $7.9 million—with a pricechop nine months later down to $7.7 million. At last, in July 2008, the home (together with the lot, we're guessing from the sale price) sold for $8.5 million. That windfall didn't save Cage, though, from having to part with his rather weird Midtown Manhattan apartment, which, after he dumped it in 2009, has remained on the market to this day.
· Five Weird, Wonderful Real Estate Follies of Nicolas Cage [Curbed National]
· 50 Gifs for Nicolas Cage's 50th Birthday [Esquire]
· Nicolas Cage's Former Los Feliz Castle-Like Home [Curbed LA]
· 898 Francisco Street [Redfin]
· Cage Lists, Withdraws Bay Area Properties [WSJ]
· Nic Cage's Former Pad Has Been on the Market Since 2012 [Curbed NY]
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