Foreign Property News | Posted by Hnin Ei Khin
The once-lavish Los Angeles mansion of fugitive Malaysian businessman Jho Low-the alleged mastermind of a multibillion-dollar international heist-has officially sold for $18.5 million.
The airy, glass-lined contemporary house, which stands on a promontory in the exclusive Bird Streets of West Hollywood, was part of one of the biggest forfeiture cases in U.S. history, in which federal prosecutors accused Mr. Low of siphoning away billions of dollars from a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund and using the ill-gotten gains to finance a luxuriant lifestyle-a scheme known as the 1Malaysia Development Bhd., or 1MDB, scandal.
Mr. Low, 38, who’s believed to be hiding in China, reached an agreement with the U.S. government in October to forfeit roughly $700 million in assets related to the case, including around $100 million in residential real estate in Los Angeles, New York and London.
His former Los Angeles mansion is the first of those homes to sell.
The new owners, who could not be identified, bought the home for roughly half off the $39 million Mr. Low paid in 2012, listing records show. But they will have to invest millions to bring it back to living condition, said Ernie Carswell, luxury real estate agent with Douglas Elliman who represented the federal government in the sale that closed Wednesday.
Six years ago, when Mr. Low bought the 1.2-acre estate from an area developer, it was a luxurious 13,000-square-foot residence with wall-to-wall glass windows and a variety of high-end amenities, including a pool, images from the time show.
Now, that pool will cost at least $1 million to restore, Mr. Carswell said.
“That’s the pool area alone. We had estimates to put the whole home back together would cost anywhere from $8 million to $12 million,” Mr. Carswell said.
Ref: Property Report
