Homes And Estates Owned By The Wealthiest People In Tech

Nearly a fifth of the world’s 100 richest billionaires made their fortune in tech. And although some of their success stories start off modestly (and most likely in a garage), many tech moguls are taking their millions and splurging on real estate.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Microsoft’s Bill Gates live less than a mile from each other in the waterfront city of Medina, Washington, and own two of the country’s most expensive estates.

Here’s a look at some of the homes of the tech industry’s elite:

Just outside of Seattle is the waterfront mansion of Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon. In the front, there’s not much to see, with the gate and tall hedges blocking the view.

Bezos and his family, which is the richest in the world, live in the tiny city of Medina, Washington, located just outside of Seattle. The sleepy town has long been a haven for tech bigwigs in the area, including Bill Gates and other Microsoft elites.

Bezos in 1998 paid $10 million for the estate, which spans 5.3 acres and includes a 20,000-square-foot house, plus a second 8,300-square-foot dwelling.

The property then underwent a $28 million renovation in 2010, around which time Bezos bought the neighboring 24,000-square-foot house, which was rumored to have sold for at least $53 million.

The Amazon leader’s estate is a big change from where he started the company: in the garage of his home in Bellevue, Washington, near Seattle seen here in 2013.

But Bezos’ Medina home is not the only property he owns, because, well, he is the richest man in the world.

Bezos also owns properties in Beverly Hills, California; a ranch in Van Horn, Texas; a former textile museum in Washington, DC; and three condos in a historic Manhattan, New York, building overlooking Central Park.

This is Bezos’ Spanish-style mansion in Beverly Hills, which he bought in 2007 for $24.45 million.

The seven-bedroom, seven-bathroom home is advertised by Dream Homes Magazine as having a greenhouse, a sunken and lighted tennis court, a huge swimming pool, four fountains, and a six-car garage.

Bezos bought a smaller house next door 10 years later.

Apparently, the first Beverly Hills house did not fit Bezos’ space requirements. In 2017, he bought a comparatively modest four-bedroom, 4,568-square-foot home for $12.9 million right next door to his first house.

Bill Gates lives about a half mile up the road from Bezos in Medina, in this $127 million compound he nicknamed “Xanadu 2.0.”

The 66,000-square-foot house is brimming with state-of-the-art technology, and has seven bedrooms and 18 3/4 bathrooms.

Gates purchased the lot for $2 million in 1988.

Gates’ house has a 23-car garage, six kitchens, 24 bathrooms, and a reception hall that can accommodate 200 guests.

The house was built with 500-year-old Douglas fir trees, and 300 construction workers labored on the home — 100 of whom were electricians.

It cost more than $60 million and took four years to build.

It also has a spectacular view of Lake Washington.

The home is also equipped with an in-house theater, trampoline room, library, and a 60-foot pool with its own underwater music system.

Charles Simonyi also lives in Medina and on Lake Washington’s waterfront.

Simonyi is the former head of Microsoft’s application software and oversaw the creation of the Office suite.

His house is known as Villa Simonyi, or the “Windows 2000 House,” because it has 2,000 windows.

Simonyi also has paintings by Roy Lichtenstein and Victor Vasarely.

Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, who owns the Los Angeles Clippers, lives in Hunts Point, Washington, just up the road from Medina.

Ballmer’s relatively modest house has four bedrooms and is on two acres.

The selling price was rumored to be $26 million.

Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey bought his San Francisco home for $9.9 million in 2012.

The 3,734-square-foot house, which has unobstructed views of the Golden Gate Bridge, is on El Camino Del Mar in the exclusive Seacliff neighborhood of San Francisco.

It has two bedrooms and two bathrooms, and is estimated to be worth $12 million.

Apple CEO Tim Cook lives modestly: He bought this 2,400-square-foot Palo Alto, California, home in 2010 for less than $2 million.

Cook is famously private, but does not exhibit the habits of other private tech elites — in contrast, Mark Zuckerberg has historically bought the properties surrounding his homes for increased seclusion.

Cook has previously said, “I like to be reminded of where I came from, and putting myself in modest surroundings helps me do that. Money is not a motivator for me.”

Spiegel and Miranda Kerr bought their 7,164-square-foot home in Brentwood, California, for $12 million in 2016.

The home has city views, a pool, a pool house, a home gym, and a guest house. It also has seven bedrooms and eight bathrooms.

The kitchen is full of white marble.

The 28-year-old billionaire and the 35-year-old Australian model hosted an estimated 50 people for their wedding ceremony and reception in May 2017 at the home. They also welcomed a son eight months ago.

The house belonged to Harrison Ford for 30 years before he sold it in 2012.

You can take a full tour of the home here.

Cofounder of Google and CEO of Alphabet, Larry Page, bought a $7.2 million home in the Old Palo Alto neighborhood of Palo Alto in 2005.

The home, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, was built from 1931 to 1941 for the Bay Area artist Pedro Joseph de Lemos.

At 9,000 square feet, the two-story home was built in the Spanish Colonial Revival style. It’s constructed of stucco and tile around a courtyard. Parts of the home were salvaged from a chapel that was partially destroyed during the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

In 2009, Page started buying adjacent properties to construct an environmentally friendly estate.

The 6,000-square-foot home has four bedrooms and a roof garden with solar panels.

Sometimes, Page’s billionaire buddy Elon Musk, who doesn’t own property in Silicon Valley, reportedly sleeps over.

Mark Zuckerberg reportedly bought his 5,617-square-foot home in Palo Alto for $7 million in 2011.

He spent an additional $45 million on the four houses and land around it for the sake of privacy.

Zuckerberg’s residence is apparently decked out with a “custom-made artificially intelligent assistant” named Jarvis.

The home has some awesome features, too: heated floors, a deep-soak tub, and a kitchen with a breakfast bar. It also has a pool and a pond.

Zuckerberg also purchased a 750-acre property on the North Shore of the Hawaiian island of Kauai, and the land includes 2,500 feet of white-sand beach.

Zuckerberg paid a reported $100 million for both properties, though Forbes reported that he plans to build just one home.

Elon Musk paid $17 million for his house on 1.66-acre plot a hilltop in the ritzy Bel Air enclave of Los Angeles.

The home overlooks the exclusive Bel-Air Country Club and has 20,248 square feet of space divided into different wings. It has seven bedrooms, nine bathrooms, a giant screening room, a home gym, a pool, and a tennis court.

The yard is fairly sprawling, and Musk and his five sons had reportedly lived in the house for three years before he bought it.

Musk also bought a ranch home across the street from the mansion for nearly $7 million in 2013.

You can see inside Elon Musk’s Belle Air Estate Here.

Larry Ellison, Oracle founder, owns more homes than he could possibly live in.

Ellison’s priciest purchase was in 2012 when he bought 98% of the Hawaiian island of Lanai.

Since then, Ellison has purchased two airlines, refurbished the island’s hotels, and started investing in clean energy sources. He plans to use the island as an experiment for environmentally sound practices.

Though the final price has not been disclosed, the Maui News put the asking price at $500 million to $600 million, making it arguably one of the most expensive private islands in the world.

Michael Dell, founder of Dell Technologies, spends his vacations at the “Raptor Residence” on the Big Island.

The 18,500-square-foot, seven-bedroom home in Hawaii was last valued at $62 million and is in the private community of Kukio.

The Dell family home, outside of Austin, Texas, looks more like a compound than the rest of the abodes of his billionaire counterparts.

The Dell family’s 33,000-square-foot home outside of Austin is known by locals as “the Castle” because of its hilltop perch and heavy security presence.

The house boasts eight bedrooms, 13 bathrooms, a tennis court, indoor and outdoor pools, and gorgeous views of Lake Austin.

Dell also owns a wide variety of real estate in Hawaii, Mexico, and California thanks to his company MSD Capital, which invests in luxury hotels, commercial and multifamily properties, and land development. The company also it participates in other real-estate-development funds.

Venture capitalist and inventor of the Netscape web browser,Marc Andreessen, resides in a three-bedroom, four-bath California home that’s valued at $24 million.

Andreessen’s home is in the Silicon Valley suburb of Atherton, California, across the street from the Menlo Circus Club — a private social club that hosts horse shows, polo matches, and gala parties for the ultra-wealthy.

Former Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer owns a relatively modest home in Palo Alto, which is estimated to be worth $5.2 million.

Located in the city’s University South neighborhood, the five-bedroom house was meant to be a place to crash after late nights in the Yahoo office.

Mayer owns several miniature balloon-dog sculptures by Jeff Koons, which she keeps in her kitchen.

Sergey Brin, cofounder of Google, bought a 3,457-square-foot Greenwich Village condo in Manhattan, New York, in 2008 for $8.5 million.

The home has 4 bedrooms, heated floors, and a sunlit living room. The home, which Brin bought with ex-wife Anne Wojcicki — CEO of 23andMe, the $1.5 billion personal-genetics company — is also within walking distance of Google’s Chelsea office.

The two-story, three-bedroom penthouse has a 1,200-square-foot wraparound terrace with views of lower Manhattan. The kitchen is outfitted with custom Moroccan tiles and top-of-the-line appliances.

Brin also has a home in Los Altos Hills, California, at an undisclosed location. But if it’s anything like his $80 million, 73-meter yacht, dubbed the Dragonfly, we can assume it is pretty elaborate.

Facebook’s chief operating officer,Sheryl Sandberg, moved into this modern 9,200-square-foot mansion in Menlo Park, California, in 2013. It features a living roof, solar panels, and a huge basement.

Sandberg’s home also has a basketball court, a wine room, and a home theatre.

The house isn’t far from Facebook’s campus either — only a 20 minute drive. Sandberg sold her Atherton, California, home for $9 million in 2014.

Investor of Facebook, Twitter, and Spotify,Yuri Milner bought this sprawling Silicon Valley mansion for $100 million in 2011.

The 30,000-square-foot French chateau-style mansion sits on 11 acres in Los Altos Hills and has views of the San Francisco Bay. The home has five bedrooms and nine bathrooms, as well as a ballroom, a home theater, a wine cellar, and an indoor pool.

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt bought his 7,000-square-foot Montecito, California, home from Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi in 2007 for $20 million.

The estate has a large backyard area with a swimming pool, a tennis court, and lots of Spanish-inspired decor.

Schmidt rented out the mansion to Kim Kardashian for her wedding to basketball player Kris Humphries in 2012.

He also owns homes in Nantucket, Massachusetts, and Atherton, California.

Co Founder and former CEO of Uber, Travis Kalanick is said to have bought a penthouse in a Soho apartment building in New York City for more than $40 million.

The Wall Street Journal reported in November 2018 that Kalanick was behind the purchase of the $40.5 million, nearly 7,000-square-foot property.

The home has four bedrooms, 4 1/2 bathrooms, floor-to-ceiling windows, and a 20-foot private rooftop pool on the building’s terrace — not to mention killer city views.

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21 Totally Free Things On The Internet

The internet is a magical tool. The best thing about it is it’s totally up to you how you use it. You’d be served well to check out the websites below. Some are educational, some are useful and some will save you money. All of them are free and definitely worth your time.

Free ways to learn something.
1. Class Central
Class Central will get you back in the classroom without the crippling student debt. You’ll have full access to recordings of college courses, plus Syllabi.

2. Open Yale
Basically the same as above, except this has you in a specific set of hallowed halls, namely Yale’s. Other colleges have similar programs, but this one stands out.

3. Coursera
Coursera features classes put together especially for the platform by professors, complete with assignments and opportunities to interact and collaborate with other students.

4. Code Academy
Code Academy will teach you the joys of coding potentially to make a bunch of money.

5. Doulingo
Duolingo is a great way to learn language built around mini-lessons in a game like format you might even enjoy.

6. Music Theory.Net
Music Theory.Net  is the perfect way for a beginner to learn how music works or to just brush up on the basics.

Free Movies and books
7. Open Culture
Open Culture has just about everything, including textbooks, movies, audiobooks, and ebooks.

8. Documentary Heaven 
The aptly named Documentary Heaven has a bunch of free documentaries.

9. Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg features over 56,000 free books (available to read online and often as a Kindle download) Most of these have entered the public domain. So if you’re looking for a throwback, you’ll find it here.


Free ways to save money

10. Retail Me Not
All coupon clippers should bookmark Retail Me Not. You can directly search for stores like H&M, Whole Foods and everything in between.

11. 10 Minute Mail
At 10 minute mail, you’ll be issued a free email address that will dissolve after 10 minutes. Why would you want that? Because you can sign up for free deals elsewhere without using your real email address.

12. Craigslist
For free stuff, you can always check out Craigslist. The people on there are weird and they throw out all kinds of stuff, including useful things you don’t want to spend money on. Like coat hangers or a taxidermied bear.

13. Mint
The best way to save money is to just get your own personal finances in order. Accountants cost money. Instead, just use the free service Mint. It’s a website/app from the people that made Turbotax built around budgeting, bill paying and credit score checking.

Free internet tools
14. IFTTT
If you’re looking for something cool and free that’ll make your life easier, IFTT will give you “recipes” to make your apps and devices work together. For example, it will teach you to turn on your lights when your Uber arrives or how to hook up Alexa to your Google calendar. It’s a little Black Mirror for some peoples tastes, but at the very least it will make your life seem more efficiant.

15. Pixlr
Pixlr is basically a free version of old Photoshop if you want to touch up your Instagram posts before they go public.

16. Paint.net
You can also use Paint.net for an improved version of MS paint.

17. Musescore
Finally, to compose music with all that knowledge from  Music Theory.Net. Check out Musescore and get cracking.

Free ways to act and feel better
18. 7 Cups
If you just need somebody to talk to and therapy is out of your budget, check out 7 Cups. It’s a free place where you can air your feelings anonymously in group chats or directly to a listener or a therapist, also anonymously.

19. Rainy Mood
If you’re just looking to block out the world, head to Rainy Mood, which plays the sound of a thunderstorm and will likely improve your concentration.

20. Stay Focused
To really concentrate though, you can just start blocking websites that distract you with the add-on Stay Focused.

21. Grammarly
If you don’t feel like getting educated by one of the websites above,  you can at least write like an educated person if you download the plug-in Grammarly. It’s basically a free spell check but slightly more advanced than what comes from your computer and focuses on grammar.

Source: thethrillist

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