It costs around $50,000 a month to keep Bel Air megamansion ‘The One’ cool in the summer
“The One Bel-Air is a once-in-a-lifetime property that can never be duplicated,” Saghian, 40, told the Los Angeles Times in a statement. “There is nothing else like it. As a lifelong Angeleno and avid collector of real estate, I recognized this as a rare opportunity that also lets me own a unique property that is destined to be a part of Los Angeles history.”
Fast fashion tycoon revealed as buyer of ‘The One,’ LA’s biggest home
The buyer of the Bel-Air mega mansion dubbed ‘The One’ has been revealed to be none other than Fashion Nova CEO Richard Saghian days after the estate sold well below its asking price at auction.
The mansion, the biggest in Los Angeles with 21 bedrooms and 49 bathrooms, was sold to Saghian for $126 million — $141 million including fees — during a no reserve auction, according to the Wall Street Journal. The sale price was a far cry from the original $500 million price point set for the estate, which would have made it the most expensive home in America, not to mention the $295 million price point when it originally hit the open market.
Saghian is local to Los Angeles but does not plan to live in the supersized home. He will instead use it as an investment.
“The One Bel-Air is a once-in-a-lifetime property that can never be duplicated,” Saghian, 40, told the Los Angeles Times in a statement. “There is nothing else like it. As a lifelong Angeleno and avid collector of real estate, I recognized this as a rare opportunity that also lets me own a unique property that is destined to be a part of Los Angeles history.”
Saghian founded Fashion Nova in 2006 in southern California. The brand sells trendy fast fashion club apparel at malls throughout California.
The mansion is built on layers and boasts unobstructed views of the Los Angeles Basin and Pacific Ocean. It has a bowling alley, cigar lounge, full service salon, and an indoor nightclub.
The home’s heavily discounted price point was necessary in part to pay off the mountain of debt accrued by the decade of construction it took to build it.
Developer Niles Niami’s company filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in October 2021, and a court ordered the massive structure to pay back its creditors. The estate was listed at $295 million in a no reserve auction.
Court documents filed earlier this month revealed that Crestlloyd, the development company, had $255.6 million in debt and an estimated $330.4 million in assets. The $126 million sale of “The One” still leaves about $129 million for the company to make up.
In December, Niami made one more push to bring the project to solvency and avoid auctioning the house at a discount, releasing a video in which he called on investors to join him in creating a new cryptocurrency dubbed ‘The One Coin’ that would treat the house as an asset. The crypto plan did not get off the ground before the house was auctioned.
While the house, originally intended to be the most expensive in the nation, did not even break records for the state of California, it did break records for the most expensive home ever to be sold at auction by 50 percent, according to Concierge Auctions, who handled the auction.
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It costs around $50,000 a month to keep Bel Air megamansion ‘The One’ cool in the summer
Earlier this year, Richard Saghian, owner of the fast-fashion business Fashion Nova, bought the Los Angeles mansion known as “The One” for $141 million.
The One was one of the biggest U.S. homes to ever go up for auction. It sold in March, fetching well below the list price of $295 million (and even further below the $500 million the developer wanted to ask in 2015).
But as it turns out, Saghian’s expenses were just getting started.
The extreme heat in California this summer has resulted in higher-than-normal electric bills for everyone, but keeping The One cool is estimated to run roughly $50,000 per month.
The 21-bedroom, 49-bath, 105,000-square-foot home saw a monthly electric bill of $27,000 last year, according to the Los Angeles Times. That, however, was when the air conditioning worked on just one level of the home.
An estate as big as The One could have as many as 50 HVAC systems, most with multiple zones—compared to one or two systems in a home of 3,000 square feet.
Lawrence Castillo, president of air-conditioning company Brody Pennell, told the L.A. Times that a property the size of The One could use roughly the same amount of energy as 40 homes that are each around 2,500 square feet, with added power draws for things like the five pools, elevators, and larger kitchen appliances.
Californians already face the fourth-highest electric bills in the country, on average. The average homeowner in Los Angeles spends $3,228 per year on electricity, according to Energy Sage, though that figure is likely to be higher this year.
Luxury homes face considerably higher potential bills. That’s why more and more are adding features like solar panels to cut owner costs.
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