Left eerily vacant for years, these A-list mansions each have a shocking tale to tell, from apparent hauntings and heartbreaking tragedy to shameless corruption, protracted legal battles and grave financial woes. Brace yourself as we reveal the eyebrow-raising stories behind these abandoned celebrity houses, including Liza Minnelli's childhood home, Boris Becker's squatted villa and Nelly's luxurious mansion that was left empty for almost a decade...
You may already be aware of Mohamed Hadid’s doomed mega-mansion, since the colossal spread has been in and out of the news for close to 10 years. Owned by multimillionaire real estate developer Mohamed Hadid, father of supermodels Gigi and Bella, the extensive estate can be found on a hillside plot in Bel Air, Los Angeles.
Since construction began in 2011, Hadid has been locked in a fierce legal battle with the Los Angeles authorities. The rather ambitious self-build project has caused plenty of controversy due to its scale and location. Hadid apparently intended to build a 14,000-square-foot mansion on the lot, but by 2014 the property had grown significantly in size, without the necessary permits from the city of Los Angeles.
The local authorities discovered that Hadid's new home covered 30,000 square feet across size floors. They immediately revoked the developer's building permits, which should have drawn any construction work to a close. Yet Hadid is rumoured to have carried on regardless, adding an extra floor underneath the basement and even installing a second swimming pool, all without a license. The LA authorities decided to take action and Hadid was sentenced to 200 hours of community service for illegal construction.
Then, in 2018, Hadid's neighbours rallied together and brought a lawsuit against him over fears the hillside home was on the brink of collapse. After a six-year legal battle, the developer lost his case in June 2020 when California’s Supreme Court declared the property a 'clear and present danger'.
Sat unfinished and abandoned for 10 years, the unbelievably extensive abandoned mansion hit the real estate market in January 2021, for a cool $8.5 million (£6m). Labelled only as a development opportunity, the Hilton & Hyland listing states that the current structure will be demolished following closure of escrow, at no additional cost to the buyer.
The singer, film star and widow of Nirvana frontman, Kurt Cobain, put her grungy three-bedroom, two-bathroom country retreat in Olympia, Washington state, on the market in 2018 with Virgil Adams Real Estate for $320,000 (£226k). According to a Variety report, the property, which sits on seven acres of land, had been left to rot and Mother Nature had taken hold.
The realtor stated in the listing description that the home was a 'major fixer' that required 'a ton of work' to return it to a state fit for human habitation. Not mincing any words, the real estate agent stated that it needed 'everything' done, and presumably called for a buyer with very deep pockets.
Love acquired the property in 1995, more or less a year after the death of her husband but clearly hadn't stayed there in years. The formerly hard-living rocker paid $447,000 (£315k) for the country retreat, so decided to sell the home, which includes a number of neglected outbuildings, at a considerable loss, having already attempted to offload it in 2011.
Considering the property's atrocious condition, it's not difficult to figure out why Love opted for such a low asking price. The interior of the house was seriously rundown and, as you can see from this and the previous photo, the walls of the eight-stall stable were covered in graffiti, while bricks littered the floor. The outhouse was positively crying out for a comprehensive makeover.
While the former rock star's home was decrepit, to say the least, the guest cottage was in the worst state, having succumbed to fire damage some time ago. Fortunately, a buyer was found and an offer was made in August 2018. Now off the market, the estate appears to have been sold at long last and is no doubt in the midst of a major refurb.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs purchased the Jackling House in Woodside, California, in 1984. The Spanish Revival property was designed by eminent architect, George Washington Smith and built in 1925 for copper mining magnate Daniel Cowan Jackling, hence the name.
Jobs must have been fond of the house at first, but he reportedly grew to loathe the property and moved out in 1994. From 2000, the home remained vacant and Jobs spent the last years of his life petitioning to get the mansion demolished.
Although the paint had started to peel away and the plaster was crumbling, the past splendour of the 35-room mansion is just about evident in these photos. Spanning 15,000 square feet, the house boasted open-air balconies, a games room, marble bathrooms and a grand staircase, as well as reception rooms complete with showy chandeliers.
Jobs ultimately won the battle and the mansion was demolished in 2011, but in a cruel twist of fate, the Apple CEO lost his fight against pancreatic cancer and died eight months later. During the 11 years of its vacancy, the billionaire's abandoned mansion lacked any kind of maintenance and fell into an appalling state of disrepair. With nobody to look after it, the décor began to be taken over by nature.
Prior to demolition, the property was covered in vines and was attracting the attention of curious photographers including Jonathan Haeber, who took these pictures. Mould had crept across the ceilings and old appliances were strewn about the place. Thankfully, the local authority collected a number of artefacts from the home before it was destroyed, including door handles, a chandelier and a toilet, and most impressive of all, a massive pipe organ.
Destined to become the UK home of Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour, the Elizabethan manor in Oxfordshire known as Hook End was built in 1580 for the Bishop of Reading. Over the years, the 11-bedroom mansion has passed through the property portfolios of the rich and famous, from Selfridges' owner Sir Charles Clore to Alvin Lee, lead singer of the band Ten Years After, who purportedly snapped up the house in 1972 and built a recording studio in the barn.
David Gilmour bought the property in 1980 and several of his band's albums were recorded in the studio. He sold up in 1986 and Hook End eventually passed to record producer Trevor Horn, who transformed the property into a luxe recording venue. An impressive line-up of musicians cut singles and LPs there, including Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Rod Stewart, the Manic Street Preachers, Seal, and the Smiths.
Steeped in history, not to mention rumours of spectral visitors, the Smiths singer Morrissey claimed to have been visited by the ghost of a monk during his stay at the manor. The phantom would appear during the wee hours of the morning as if to wake people to pray.
Tragedy struck the historic home in 2006, when Trevor Horn's wife, Jill Sinclair, was shot accidentally by their son, Aaron, who was practicing with his air rifle, unaware his mother was nearby. Sinclair fell into a deep coma and never fully recovered. Horn decided to sell up following the accident and the property was bought by producer Mark White in 2009 for $17 million (£12m).
White invested in the studio but the house lay neglected for years. Trevor Bishenden, aka TrevBish Photography, captured the property's dilapidated interiors in 2017 when the manor appeared to be completely abandoned, with rising damp and wallpaper peeling off the walls. Fortunately, Hook End has since been given a new lease of life and renovated from top to bottom.
Built in 1925 and subsequently redesigned by noted Hollywood Regency architect, John Elgin Woolf, this Spanish Revival mansion in LA's Beverly Hills was purchased in the mid-1950s by Oscar-winning director Vincente Minnelli, following his divorce from Judy Garland. During her childhood, the former couple's daughter, Liza, spent much of her time at the house.
The celebrity's childhood home on Crescent Drive was once lavishly decorated by Vincente Minnelli, with numerous chandeliers and opulent fabrics and furnishings. When the famed director passed away in 1986 at the age of 83, the house was left to Liza, now a big-time Hollywood star in her own right, on one condition…
While Liza was granted ownership, Mr Minnelli instructed that his fourth wife, Lee, should be permitted to live in the house as long as she desired. The arrangement worked out fine until 2000 when Liza decided to sell the property. Lee was offered a condo but turned it down and resolutely stayed put, even when the house was sold in 2002.
Things turned nasty when Liza stopped paying the bills on the house and ceased paying staff, who ended up working for free. Lee filed a lawsuit against her stepdaughter but dropped the case when Liza agreed to pay the new owners rent so Lee could continue living in the mansion. Lee died there in 2009 but the home was seemingly left to languish and decay, attracting urban explorer Adam The Woo there in 2014.
In recent shots captured on his YouTube channel, the dilapidated dream home wasn't looking its best by a long shot. Holes peppered the ceilings, the wallpaper was peeling away and shabby furniture and debris were scattered on the floors. Sadly, the home appears to be abandoned to this day.
The Queen pulled out all the stops in 1986, when she gifted her now-disgraced son, Prince Andrew, Duke of York, and his wife, Sarah, Duchess of York, a 665-acre parcel of land on the Sunninghill Park Estate in Berkshire following their wedding that same year. A swish 12-bedroom mansion was designed featuring grand reception rooms, stables and a swimming pool, and construction work began on the flashy royal residence in 1987.
Andrew and Fergie's marriage broke down not long after they moved in and the couple divorced in 1996, yet the duo continued to live under the same roof with their two daughters. Following the Queen Mother's death in 2002, the Duke decamped to the Royal Lodge in Windsor, her former residence, and Sunninghill Park was put on the market. The Duchess and their daughters followed in 2006, leaving the property vacant.
The Duke, who has since become embroiled in the Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking scandal, was said to have remortgaged Sunninghill Park to cover the cost of renovating the Royal Lodge. He lucked out in 2007 when he sold it to Kazakhstani investor Kenes Rakishev for $21 million (£15m), $4.3 million (£3m) over the asking price, in a deal viewed by some as suspect. The ultimate owner was later revealed to be billionaire oligarch, Timur Kulibayev.
By 2009, Sunninghill Park was in a dilapidated state and the property was pretty much abandoned. In December 2013, planning permission was granted to replace the rundown royal residence with a sprawling manor, but demolition work didn't begin until 2015. A far cry from the British royal family's grand private homes, the eyesore was eventually reduced to rubble in 2016, and a shiny new mansion has taken shape in its place.
Flush with cash at the time, Boris Becker bought the idyllic Finca de Son Coll on the Spanish island of Mallorca in 1997. The German tennis ace purchased the property for a reported $598,000 (£422k) and proceeded to spend a fortune on it, adding a pool with a Moroccan-style pool house, a guesthouse, basketball court, and more. But the dream home soon turned into a nightmare…
Becker was slapped with a $255,000 (£180k) fine in 2004 for additions that weren't approved by the authorities and was ordered to tear them down. In 2007, the property was put on the market for the purportedly hefty asking price of $18.4 million (£13m) but no buyer could be found.
The Grand Slam singles champion struggled to afford the upkeep. In 2011, Becker was sued by his gardener who was owed $354,000 (£250k). As ordered by the Spanish court, the property was confiscated until the outstanding bill was paid. It was confiscated again in 2014 when Becker failed to settle an invoice for building work.
Becker eventually paid the invoice and recouped the property, only to lose it for good following his bankruptcy in 2017. The finca passed to the administrators but was commandeered by German squatter, Georg Berres and members of his so-called Intergalactic Auxiliary and Rescue Command.
In October 2019, a local court ruled against the squatters and ordered them to leave, with the crew removed by police in January of 2020. Now crumbling and decidedly grubby, the decadent abandoned mansion faces an uncertain future.
Before his fall from grace, Michael Jackson teamed up with Paul McCartney to record Say Say Say in 1983. The former Beatle stayed at Sycamore Valley Ranch in California when the pair were recording the single’s music video, and after visiting McCartney there, Jackson fell in love with the place, promising to buy it someday. Some years later, he acquired the American estate in 1988 for an estimated $19.5 million (£13.7m).
Jackson renamed the property Neverland after the magical island in Peter Pan and set about creating his very own amusement park. The singer had two railways and a station built to complement the six-bedroom Tudor-style mansion that came with the property and installed a petting zoo and numerous amusement rides.
Neverland had everything from a Ferris wheel and pirate ship ride to a carousel and bumper cars. Jackson hosted glittering events at the ranch, including the 1991 wedding of his close friends, Elizabeth Taylor and Larry Fortensky, and often invited children to stay, sometimes without their parents or legal guardians.
Needless to say, Jackson's behaviour raised suspicions. Neverland was ransacked by police when allegations came to light and the singer was charged with child abuse in 2003. Jackson was eventually cleared of all charges, though 2019's harrowing Leaving Neverland documentary has called the acquittal into question. Drowning in debt, the disgraced singer struggled to hold on to the property and Neverland Ranch was shut down in 2006.
After Jackson defaulted on the ranch's mortgage, investment firm Colony Capital bought a majority stake in Neverland in 2008 for $22.5 million (£15.8m). Following Jackson's death in 2009, the property fell into disrepair. It’s clear that Neverland is deemed toxic real estate because the controversial home has been put up for sale several times over the past few years but has proved, unsurprisingly, impossible to sell.
The former heavyweight champion boxer snapped up this glitzy confiscated mansion in Southington, Ohio at a sheriff's sale in 1989 for the bargain price of $300,000 (£212k). The 25,000-square-foot pad was built in 1979 by local politician Ted Vannelli, who was later jailed on corruption charges. Captured by photographer, Johnny Joo, these images were featured on the Architectural Afterlife website.
No expense was spared on the magnificent five-bedroom mansion, which was decked out with an enormous pool, two massive kitchens, three cages for Tyson's expensive Bengal tigers, copious amounts of marble, crystal chandeliers and zebra-print carpets. Whether the mansion is cursed or not is anyone's guess, but three of its owners have ended up behind bars.
In 1992, Tyson was convicted of rape and subsequently spent three years in prison. Upon his release in 1995, the troubled boxer returned to live at the property. Up to his eyeballs in debt thanks to his spendthrift lifestyle, the ex-con sold the property in 1999 to infomercial tycoon Paul Monea for $1.3 million (£918k), making a tidy profit on the transaction.
Many of the fixtures and fittings were removed but some, including Tyson's bathtub, reportedly worth $2 million (£1.4m), remained untouched. Hemelgarn never lived at the mansion but did manage to restore part of the property. The estate was passed on in 2014 to the Living Word Sanctuary Church and now serves as the religious community's base and principal place of worship. Much like these abandoned stately homes, we're sure this pad harbours plenty of secrets...
During the early noughties, you couldn't turn on the radio without hearing Nelly's huge hits Dilema and Hot In Here. The rapper is still thought to be worth an astonishing $40 million (£28.2m). Back in 2002, during the height of his fame, the star bought this lavish Tuscan-style mansion for an estimated $2 million (£1.4m).
Reports suggest that Nelly never actually wanted to live in the house. Instead, he purchased it with the intention of flipping it, much like some other well-known celebrity house developers. But for some unknown reason, the 10,799-square-foot mansion has sat empty for the past two decades.
Though it's unclear why the Ride Wit Me singer ditched his makeover plans, it's likely the home proved too expensive to restore. Sitting on a prominent 12-acre plot in St. Louis, Missouri, the home benefits from fantastic landscape views from almost every room. While the exterior has a palatial white stucco finish with castle-like turrets, the interior is brimming with high-end fixtures – think vaulted ceilings, arched windows, marble floors, full-height fireplaces and imposing columns.
Constructed in 1998, the home featured six bedrooms and seven bathrooms, as well as a grand entrance foyer, a double-height lounge and a Great Room overlooking the garden. Yet it's far from finished. In fact, the house currently has no plumbing and some rooms are missing floors. The extreme fixer-upper certainly has plenty of renovation potential, though.
Outside, the huge garden offers an abandoned basketball court and pool, as well as woodland trails that wind down towards the Meramec River valley. Nelly eventually decided to part ways with the property, listing it for $599,000 (£423k) in February 2021. Unsurprisingly, the colossal estate found a buyer within just a few days of hitting the market.
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