Category: Investment

In the depths of the last housing crisis, self-storage billionaire B. Wayne Hughes flew to Las Vegas and Phoenix to lay the groundwork for a new bet. His plan: Buy foreclosed homes, spruce them up and rent them out. He tested his ideas on three houses in each market and then dispatched deputies to buy tens of thousands more across the U.S.

Nine years later the land grab is paying off as an economic downturn, the rising unaffordability of homeownership and a global pandemic push a new generation to suburban home rentals. Home offices, yards and space between neighbors are becoming must haves. Investors who spent the last decade gobbling up these types of houses are emerging as beneficiaries of the Covid-19 era.

Few firms are better situated to benefit from this shift than Mr. Hughes’s American Homes 4 Rent, which has about 53,000 suburban houses in 22 states

An unfinished, Old World-style mansion in Los Angeles recently landed on the SoCal luxury market. Listed for $30 million, it’s this week’s most expensive new listing on realtor.com®.

The massive mansion, billed as “Chateau Philippe,” takes its architectural inspiration from France. It offers eight bedrooms, 10 bathrooms, and every upscale amenity a SoCal Francophile might desire.

A 2016 post on the Homes of the Rich website billed it as a “newly built” French chateau. The price listed at the time was the same as it is today.

Now, four years later, the home’s photos appear to show a few rooms in need of finishing touches. The listing notes that the home is “soon to be completed.”

Inside the Bel Air

Drew and Jonathan Scott have been household names in the home renovation world for years. And while they’re known for their incredible home transformations on “Property Brothers,” they can’t always be on their A-game. Over the years, they’ve had their share of design fails, too.

As proof, just check out these home design bloopers below. Consider them warnings of what not to do to your home, and learn how the brothers typically fix these mistakes so you can, too.

Not enough storage

Drew and Jonathan are usually good at providing lots of storage in a home. Still, there’s one place they sometimes fall short: the entryway.

In one renovation, they brought in a bench with a few drawers, then installed three pegs for hanging hats, coats, and purses. At least it was something, but the brothers could do better.