We live a few hundred yards from the same beach and ocean the folks in Malibu, California enjoy – the very same – just at the south end – next stop being Antarctica.
Looking at the real estate market in Malibu, we notice many stars have been trying to unload their multi-million-dollar digs there. Actually they buy and sell Malibu property amongst themselves a lot.
Yes, Malibu beach-and-hill-country getaway for celebs and rich folk up the Pacific Coast Highway from Los Angeles is pretty comparable to here in Puerto Escondido. We often comparison shop real-estate values to there.
Cher’s Malibu mansion had been for sale since 2008, when she listed it for $45 million. Then reducing the asking price to $41 million. A couple of years ago Beyonce bought it. I had no idea she made that kind of money even with Jay Z – yikes!
Many star estates are still on the market, and probably will be for some time to come. Especially Leonardo DiCaprio’s pad. He wants $23 million for his three-house beachfront Malibu “compound” (which sounds better than it looks — apart from the beach view). “I bought it from Leo DiCaprio” just doesn’t add enough caché to make it worth $23 million.
“Why are the movie stars leaving Malibu?”
Apparently Leo was not happy about the proletariat being allowed on the beach near his casa. The state and local authorities have been aggressively enforcing the general public’s right to frolic on the beaches That does not appeal to many of the rich and famous in the colony. They did not pay tens of millions of dollars to share a beach with a truck driver and his family that drove over from the Valley. I should mention here Mexico has similar laws regarding the general public’s right to use the beach common.
We do live next-door to an exclusive guarded community where many government officials and their families enjoy some pretty secured privacy tight up to the sand. I have mentioned that ex prez Vicente Fox’s daughter is our neighbor – although we have not borrowed a cup of sugar from her as of yet.
“Why are the movie stars leaving Malibu?” So we can move on from this.
“… because the state and local authorities have been aggressively enforcing the general public’s right to frolic on the beaches. ”
The beaches of Malibu can be crowded with well over a million people on a hot holiday afternoon. When you consider Malibu has an official full-time population (including the full-time celebrities who are part-time Malibuites) of only about 13,000, that’s a lot of strangers strolling on the strand.
But that battle over beachfront homeowners’ right to privacy versus the general public’s right to access public property has been ongoing for the better part of a century, so that certainly isn’t the only reason celebs are selling off their Malibu properties.
Here in Puerto the Calypso couple stay out of the fray during holidays. We become home bodies. The crowds dot the beach with assurance they will be gone soon enough. We think the greatness of beach living is worth this inconvenience.
In Malibu up in the hills on the other side of the Pacific Coast Highway, there are frequent devastating wildfires in the dry season engulfing mudslides in the wet season. We do not have that in Puerto just the occasional street flooding here and there.
And all over Malibu there are sewage problems because the municipality operates solely on septic tank systems (to discourage large-scale development) instead of a sewage pipe and treatment system.
As well as endless, ongoing problems for individual homeowners, the septic mess has also led to an ocean contamination problem, especially in Malibu Lagoon where Malibu Creek empties out a stew of polluted water. The lagoon has recently been “rehabilitated” but in the late ’90s, a number of surfers — at least five — died from water-borne diseases they contracted while surfing in the area. Yikes – no pollution deaths here. But we have minor problems in that area.
Speaking of pollution, there is endless sensory pollution along the PCH (Pacific Coast Highway), where every fast-food chain in the world has outlets crammed in between gas stations and “beach” bars. And, of course, the highway itself is a constant, ceaseless traffic jam.
Other than the occasional convenience store OXXO we do not have that.
But the real reason movie stars are leaving Malibu is because that’s what movie stars do.
They make lots of money entertaining us and then they buy ridiculously priced properties all over the world with that money (often as an “investment”). They visit their properties occasionally — more often in Malibu, because of its proximity to LA, than in Maui or Mauritius — and then they become bored or dissatisfied with the properties or their financial advisers advise them to unload the “investment” or an ex-spouse gets the property (or cash equivalent) in a divorce settlement or whatever.
Puerto Escondido is not included in that. I think there is one famous old Mexican actor housed just down the road from our casa – but no stars about here. And that is OK with us. After all this is Puerto Escondido (English: “Hidden Port”). Stay Tuned!