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Bill Gates
Medina,
Wash.
Rank: 1
Net
Worth: $46.6 billion
Bill
Gates has gone underground. The high-tech billionaire's home is built into a
hillside on the edge of Lake Washington, near
Seattle. The 66,000-square-foot compound
includes a 60-foot-long swimming pool with an underwater music system, a
domed library with two "secret" bookcase doors and a
1,000-square-foot dining room. The family quarters, however, are said to be
modest. The estate includes 11 surrounding properties that Gates bought,
which goes some way toward explaining his local taxes. The properties are
valued at nearly $140 million, and this year's bill came to $1.1 million,
according to the King County Journal.
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Warren Buffett
Omaha,
Nebr.
Rank: 2
Net
Worth: $44 billion
The
"Oracle of
Omaha" lives in mighty modest digs, given the size of his fortune. He still resides
in the gray stucco home he bought in 1958 for $31,500. Totaling about 6,000
square feet, in 2003 the Happy Hollow house was assessed at just $700,000
(though the value investor thought it was really worth about $500,000). Buffett sold one of his two properties in Laguna Beach,
Calif., but retained one valued at about $4 million. That's still less than one
hundredth of a percent of his estimated net worth.
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Larry Ellison
Woodside,
Calif.
Rank: 9
Net
Worth: $18.4 billion
The
co-founder of Oracle doesn't shy away from major real estate deals. In 2003,
he set jaws dropping when he spent $65 million on five beachfront properties
in
Malibu so
he could create a custom compound (a local realtor said Ellison bought one
house just for the pool). Then there's his mega-estate in Woodside, about 30
miles south of
San Francisco.
Set on 23 acres, it's fit for an emperor, having been built in the style of
an imperial Japanese palace
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Michael Dell
Austin,
Tex.
Rank: 18
Net
Worth: $16 billion
Dell's
estate is no cozy dell. The 33,000-square-foot mansion is perched on a
hilltop in the college town where he founded his eponymous computer company.
Though he reportedly spent tens of millions of dollars building the estate,
in the late 1990s he wrangled with local assessors over its value, which was
finally pegged at $12 million.
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Steven Spielberg
East Hampton,
N.Y.
Rank: 219
Net
Worth: $2.7 billion
Quelle Farm, Steven Spielberg's summer retreat in the Hamptons, has good--or at least expensive--company. It
sits on
Georgica Pond, across the
water from the estate that broke
New
York real estate records last year when it sold for
$45 million. Other high-profile neighbors include financier Ron Perelman and
designer Calvin Klein. Needless to say, these aren't Spielberg's only digs;
he also has homes in
Manhattan and Pacific
Palisades,
Calif.
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Oprah Winfrey
Montecito,
Calif.
Rank: 507
Net
Worth: $1.3 billion
Oprah
is just one of the reasons Montecito is sometimes called "Moneycito" (neighbor Ty
Warner, who made a fortune from Beanie Babies, is another). The self-made
media mogul paid $50 million for the 23,000-square-foot
Georgian-style home in 2001. Last year, as a
wedding gift, she threw her longtime personal trainer a black tie wedding on
the 43-acre estate. Her real estate portfolio also reportedly includes a ski
house in
Colorado and beachfront property in
Hawaii. No
more
Indiana
farm, though. Media reports say she found a buyer in December.
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Mark Cuban
Dallas,
Tex.
Rank: 507
Net
Worth: $1.3 billion
Mark
Cuban's ABC reality television show, The Benefactor, in which
contestants competed for $1 million, hoped to rival Donald Trump's The Apprentice,
but only lasted for a season. Meanwhile, Cuban's properties include homes in
Miami,
Los Angeles and,
curiously enough, the Trump International building in
New York City. Still, the Internet
billionaire and owner of the
Dallas
Mavericks can always retreat to his main residence, a 24,000-square-foot home
he bought several years ago for $14 million.
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Craig McCaw
Hunt's
Point,
Wash.
Rank: 306
Net
Worth: $2.1 billion
Craig
McCaw is no newcomer to luxury real estate--he grew
up in a 20,000-square-foot home in
Seattle.
Several years ago, he reportedly paid $20 million for this
English-manor-style estate built by Kenneth Gorelick
(aka musician Kenny G.). Hunts Point pokes into
Lake Washington, whose waters also wash onto the private beaches of Bill
Gates and Paul Allen
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David Koch
New York,
N.Y.
Rank: 138
Net
Worth: $4 billion
David
Koch and family may not have even moved into this opulent spread yet, since
they had planned extensive renovations. Last year, Koch was said to have bid
$17 million for the 18-room duplex in
740 Park Ave., one of the most
exclusive buildings in
Manhattan.
The 17-story building is also home to
George
David, head of United Technologies, who paid $25 million for his place last
year, and financier Stephen Schwarzman, who bought
part of John D. Rockefeller's old apartment.
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David Geffen
Beverly Hills,
Calif.
Rank: 117
Net
Worth: $4.4 billion
When
Geffen splurged on this
Beverly Hills estate,
he set a
Los Angeles
real estate record. The music mogul paid $47.5 million for the 100-room
mansion, which has its own three-hole golf course. The real kicker? That was
15 years ago. Geffen later explained that the home, owned by late studio head
Jack Warner, included a trove of art and antiques. Geffen's real estate
holdings also include a
Malibu
beach home.
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2006-01-09
