Most Expensive House In The World 2008

One of the most popular articles on this website is actually Most Expensive House In The World, which briefly discusses 2 properties in London that were purchased for a staggering £70m, which set new world records. Unfortunately, that’s yesterday’s news; it’s now staler than the ciabatta I’m having for lunch.

So what’s the latest? Well, apparently £70m won’t buy you the most expensive house in the world; it won’t even buy you the swimming pool located in the most expensive house in the world. To give you an idea of what’s actually happened: there’s a new Rolls-Royce in town, and the previous successor has been downgraded to a Lada.

A new record for the most expensive house in the world has been set, and it’s not only squeezed past the previous record holder, it’s shamelessly smashed through the barriers and has setup camp in a whole new league.

How much was the most expensive house in the world bought for?

£392m. I kid you not. That’s enough to cure a small third-world county, sadly.

Who owns the most expensive house in the world?

Russian precious-metal mogul, Mikhail Prokhorov.

About the property

The property goes by the name Villa Leopolda, a Belle Époque mansion in the French town of Villefranche-sur-Mer on the Cote d’Azur, on the French Riviera. It was built in 1902 for Belgian King Leopold II.

In August 2008, the previous owner, Lily Safra (wife of the deceased Syrian (Lebanon-born) businessman Edmond Safra), a famous Jewish philanthropist, decided to sell it to its new Russian owner.

The estate is so big that it requires 50 full time gardeners. The grounds cover 20 acres of garden and visitors can stroll amongst 1,200 olive, orange, lemon and cypress trees.

Unlike the previous most expensive houses in the world, there is extremely little information about the property out there, so it’s difficult to know exactly what we’re meant to be envious of (besides from all that wealth). I can’t even tell you guys how many bedrooms, bathrooms and parking spaces there are. But I imagine it could comfortably house The Waltons, and the monthly electricity bill probably costs more than my entire house.

I have a feeling more information will start to surface as more people start to get a little bit more curious. However, everything has been pretty hush, hush; even the owners are refusing to admit that they actually purchased the damn thing.

But I guess the lavish details aren’t that important, the main fact is that someone purchased a property in France for £392m, consequently there are people out there that have so much money that it makes me want to cry! To put things into perspective, I don’t even have £1 in my pocket right now, just a few coppers cluttering up my Ikea desk. I’m trying hard not to think about it too much, because it can become pretty demoralising knowing that my yearly salary wouldn’t even cover this guy’s weekly grocery expenses.

Pictures of the property

Like the lack of information, there’s also a shortage of clear pictures. But this is what I managed to find…

Does that look like a property worth £392m? Hmmm…your guess is as good as mine.

About the owner, Mikhail Prokhorov

Prokhorov is ranked as the 24th richest man in the world with a $22 billion fortune. Born May 3, 1965, he’s a Russian self-made billionaire. He made his name in the financial sector and went on to become one of Russia’s leading industrialists in the precious metals sector. He is the former chairman of Norilsk Nickel, the world’s largest producer of nickel and palladium, and the current chairman of Polyus Gold, Russia’s largest gold producer.

So what’s a man worth $22 billion look like? You guessed it….like Bob Saget.

If anyone has any further information on this property, please let me know!

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Talk / 53 Comments left so far

unknown wrote this on 2008-10-12 00:42:44 wow man i am guess some people don't have a life but a dream man i wish i lived there 1

Joe wrote this on 2008-10-27 13:14:01 This might sound really odd but for 392m its a pretty shit house. If I could afford to Im sure i could find a better house for 50m. 2

alex wrote this on 2008-10-29 19:17:48 what could POSSIBLY justify spending almost 400 million pounds on one house? how is a house that costs that much going to make your life so much better than a house that costs, say, 20 million? it doesn't even have a massive estate - I know that you can buy houses with hundreds of acres for a fraction of that price - it's just got 20!
this is just utterly ridiculous. yeah, rich people should be able to have luxuries and enjoy what they've earnt, but this is the biggest waste of cash I've ever heard of. it's true, that money could probably cure famine, AIDs etc for millions of people, at least for a year or so. a house for ONE man, at the expense of millions of lives potentially saved and improved.
I'm really going on about this but it's so out of order and selfish. 3

LuxResidence wrote this on 2008-11-13 23:29:02 actually this record was broke 4 weeks ago in Geneva by the crown prince of saoudi arabia talks says 620 millions pounds 4

bob wrote this on 2008-11-18 15:11:51 omg very big house 5

Tania wrote this on 2008-12-16 07:05:37 Does anyone know the 5 Most expensive properties worldwide? 6

bex wrote this on 2008-12-31 19:51:36 omg this hose is sooo nice!! i love it!! but i wouldnt pay that amount of money. i've got a reasonably nice house thats worth £250.000!! 7

Sarah wrote this on 2009-01-21 00:16:15 Wow, that house is huge! And the person who owns it... Wow! I mean, you usually expect really rich people to be really old and fat and everything but this guy... And I thought that my best friends house is big, being 2000 square metres 8

Chi wrote this on 2009-02-03 23:44:07 However much any of these houses (complexes, principalities etc) cost - one thing you can guarantee is that the decor will be mingin'! 9

eshiwe wrote this on 2009-02-04 06:10:32 it,s wonderful i love tobe like this man who have most world expensive house,but if i were you i save the world help orders who don,t have home and money to eat the poor.god be with you thanks 10

dave halsey wrote this on 2009-02-07 20:19:07 Well, firstly, I think the author of quote 11 needs to go back to school.......secondly, what's wrong with a 3 bed semi ? You can only be in one room at a time.....right ? Seriously though, great house.....we all dream of making sxxt loads of money and living a splendid life. Good luck to him. 11

Josie wrote this on 2009-02-15 01:41:20 That house is worth $424,344,200.00 (four hundred twenty-four million, three hundred forty-four thousand, two hundred dollars)! Wow! 12

ulises wrote this on 2009-02-19 17:27:43 thats just crazy i own a 300,000 dollar home and its nice and cozzy thats all i need,but personaly if i was him i would help people out because in the end when we die we wont take all thoes nice things.

take care :) 13

harold wrote this on 2009-02-26 23:32:46 biiiigggggggggggggggggggggggg house!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i love it 14

Moreno wrote this on 2009-03-23 19:30:24 damn! i'll be just happy if the let me live at the frontyatd of the house,so i can be proud of myn neighbour 15

festus eze wrote this on 2009-03-31 11:03:34 whao dat house is realy big,but come to think of it is like the money was wasted.he cant sleep in all the rooms at a time.but i am proud of him 16

cliton james wrote this on 2009-03-31 11:07:33 well i would say if i had dat kind of money i will spend it on imparting lives.i live on a 370.000 dollars house and i am confortable there.but am proud of him 17

Seven wrote this on 2009-04-10 16:33:52 Man we all gat 2 die somday y dont ya jus free up som a dat 22b into circulation, u and the prince n warren and bill and u rest a hierarchy friends so d world can be a lil beta placs, Zimmi a say? 18

C wrote this on 2009-04-11 15:17:43 u were sayin what could justify spending nearly £400m on a house - well if u hav that much money then u may as well use it. If u had it and didn't spend it wot use would it be? 19

Mr Rouch wrote this on 2009-04-28 23:04:10 All you people that say he should have spent his money on curing something should shove it. That’s right, it’s his money and if he has it then he can buy it. I bet that house provides many families around it with jobs. You people need to start worrying about yourselves and not those third world countries. 20

Raja ajmal janjua wrote this on 2009-05-18 18:25:26 Raja ajmal janjua of kahuta owns a property worth 700 million pounds. 21

Ian wrote this on 2009-05-26 20:55:50 Posters #11 and #18, thank you, I just laughed my head off reading your comments! Excellent! 22

haider.ramadhan wrote this on 2009-05-31 19:10:04 the life is too short when you think correctly.there is no fairness in this life, everyone thinks of himself.that is why too many people die of poverty.At the end you feel you didnt live at all.I need only nice reasonable house normal food reasonable car and nice dressing and no stress is enough. 23

me wrote this on 2009-06-17 01:54:01 one word: GREED 24

JOSHUA wrote this on 2009-06-27 08:07:59 WOww!!AMAZING HOUSE! I LIKE TO BUY THT HAUZ!! iTS REALLY EXPENSIVE!! 25

Audrey wrote this on 2009-07-16 00:06:17 LOVE IT!! I wonder how long it would take to stop getting lost both in the house and grounds... Me probably about 2 weeks. 26

saoirse wrote this on 2009-07-20 14:23:55 man you are a lucky dued,you must have trillions of money but money dont always make u happy,i hope u are happy saoirse xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 27

saoirse wrote this on 2009-07-20 14:56:28 by the way the three people who wrote number 2 and 3 and 4 u should mind ur own earswax ur only being like that because u arent happy with ur own life,the one who wrote selfish im sure u know alot about it because u are,the one who wrote 2 idont think it is odd i think it is plain stupid and to the person that wrote number 4 how would u know that the record was broke 4 weeks ago u are not the smartest person in the world and dont say it was on the news because my mum and dad watch the news everyday and they read the news paper and tell me everything (i know what u are thinking boring) 28

Lee wrote this on 2009-08-07 09:35:43 To much bling for me, but good luck to him...might have been worth investing some cash into a decent haircut though 29

Misbahu wrote this on 2009-08-28 16:45:48 well it is ok tell this business moguel to invest even 10% of it in helping d needy ones may b GOD may grant him mercy in here after. 30

Pravin Chandra wrote this on 2009-09-25 02:34:23 I have a bedroom house worth approx $400K, neat and tidy. Spend most of my spare time in the garden. Just love it, whay else do you need. 31

Sabine wrote this on 2009-09-25 21:20:41 Lol, I bet the estate agent wo sold the place was a very happy bunny. 32

Neil wrote this on 2009-09-28 16:36:30 Prokhorov bid $750 million for Villa Leopolda, a 15-fold increase of its actual market value. That bid, some claimed, was part of Prokhorov’s plan to seek the official vindication from the French government.

But he withdrew his bid and lost his $50 million deposit, Villa Leopolda has been valued at less than $50 million.

$50 million for NOT buying a house !! Easy come - Easy go. 33

divad a123 wrote this on 2009-11-03 21:43:58 its a nice house and i would have it but i would only want a house witch is a nice size
to manage and easyly heated 34

Dan6663 wrote this on 2009-11-08 01:35:55 To the person who wrote 28, dont be silly... this page has comments allowed on it fo people to disscuss how they feel about the topic, it dosent make them selfish its just their opinon. I for on agree, 400mill is far too much for a house, it just goes to show how much corruption and evil this world is. What do you think this guy is doing with the millions, no billions he dosent even use? Buying another ridiculous house? When they could all be used to reduce half of the worlds problems 35

divad a123 wrote this on 2009-11-10 20:41:10 the people that buy these houses are normaly on there own WHAT is the point when your proberbly not even going to go in all the bloody rooms buy smaller houses and which are in a nice locations and what a waste of heat having underfloor heating on the driveway when it is outside 36

billy wrote this on 2009-12-10 16:16:33 man that house is so big but would not spend that much money on it. that is so stupid to spend 400 million dollars on one house that is so stupid!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 37

Torrie wrote this on 2010-01-01 14:40:30 You all really need to grow up! Nearly all of you say he should help this charity or that organisation but but to say this as bluntly as i possibly can without offending YOU WOULDN'T!!! as much as you all like to say you would its total crap you would spend like crazy and if you had the money you wouldn't have any worries about what costs what and it becomes a quest of the more it costs the more you want it to say that you own it! SO on my final note I congratulate the man and hope he has Health and happiness to go with his wealth! 38

SHARON wrote this on 2010-01-08 22:32:50 THIS JUST MAKES U THINK THAT IF WE WORK REALLY HARD FOR WHAT WE NEED IN LIFE WE CAN ACHIEVE IT.ITS A MOTIVATOR , WE WILL HAVE WHAT HE HAVE ,BUT WHAT IS WELL WORKED IS WELL DESERVE. WE SHOULD NOT GRUDGE THY NEIGHBOR FOR WHAT THEY HAVE BE HAPPY WITH WHAT U HAVE WHICH IS LIFE N MOVE ON 39

Dott Cotton wrote this on 2010-01-14 14:52:59 The rich man shall never enter the kingdom of heaven. 40

frankie0778 wrote this on 2010-01-16 19:27:10 Just goes to show that with all that money most people lose their sense of reality. Richard Branson bought a whole island for less than one million 41

Derek wrote this on 2010-02-05 17:04:31 WoW, our cheapest house start at on 20,000 so i guess he could buy several thousand of them and still have change
http://www.chavetejo.com/property%20for%20sale%20in%20central%20portugal.htm 42

stangkilla wrote this on 2010-02-17 06:44:47 I would rather live in a shack on the rocks than a castle in the sand....bc in the end none of the worldly materialistic things will be going with me... 43

Eric Ibekwe wrote this on 2010-05-02 14:13:55 Ds house is big and wondaful but is pretty quite expensive.I can only spend dat kind of dough if only it can guarantee happiness. 44

the dude wrote this on 2010-05-08 12:19:34 wow thats a lot of money! i used to live in a large house, it was worth 500,000 and we done it up. Then we could no longer afford to live in it with all the bills ect, and it sold for £1,000,000. Sadly we only rented the house, and ended up making the owners a lot of money. Now i live in a council house, but im not complaining. Im gonna make it all back :) haha. 45

ginvc wrote this on 2010-06-03 14:16:54 Yes that guy is freeking nuts all that for a hse... but again he has the money what do u want him to do wit it?

Its funny that your year income cannot buy him grocery i had a laugh at that ha haahahahaha 46

Mel wrote this on 2010-06-06 06:24:17 Can only dream of the stuff this house inside of it.
The amount of bedrooms, bathrooms, pools, tennis courts, bowling alleys, etc. This house may not LOOK like it's worth so much money but you have NOOO idea what this house contains!
If I had the money I would buy or build a house worth this much or more, a majority of people would agree with me. Yes I would help people out but I would spend the majority of my fortune in myself as we all would! Who's to know that this wealthy person doesn't help people out with his fortune.
We're all different and would all spend our money differently. Obviously most of us are jealous of this person, I know I definately am I would love to just set foot on this property let alone having a tour!
You also have no idea if this person lives alone, they would have family and staff and even if they do live alone that's really their business they're LOADED!!! 47

Pat wrote this on 2010-06-25 15:13:26 Nice house 48

dave wrote this on 2010-07-04 07:10:47 i think you lot are forgetting that this guy is a multi BILLIONAIRE!!!!!
this house is pocket money to him, and the chances are that he probably does give millions to charity, and helps other people.
good on him, hes obviously very clever and works (worked) very hard unlike all the lazy people in the world who sit on their benefit ridden Ar@@s and then moan because people who work hard have more money than them! 49

richgirl3000 wrote this on 2010-07-31 12:57:26 heyyyy you guys who say 'omigod, its totally wrong to spend millions on a house' are just saying that stuff cuz you cant afford to spend millions on a house. But lets be realistic. If you did, you would. I live in this pace called Updown court. search it. its awsome. I live down the road from the queen. But you are all saying that its stupid my dad spent 65,000,000 pounds on it, well he earnt that money so i think that its perfectly fair that he lives in luxery!!! And i will earn it too. See my family owns some sort of a company from America...Heck i dont even know what its called. but all i can say is that i have been living in luxury scince i was in dipers but i think its fair since my family got up off their fannys and made the money. if you guys tryed i bet you could too... 50

richgirl3000 wrote this on 2010-07-31 13:02:15 oh yeah and if you are saying 'i wouldnt spend that much on a house because its stupid, spend your money on more important stuff', a home is pretty important and people like me who buy houses for 65,000,000 have enough money to spend on 'more important stuff' as well, so if we have the money for an awsome house like this, why shouldnt we spend it on an awsome house like this? 51

ihaterichegirl3000 wrote this on 2010-08-25 23:05:59 I've come to personally know a couple of economically well placed people in my life, and I can tell you that most of them don't do much. I mean they rushed hard for a couple of years (like most people do), but settled down quickly and don't do much now. Don't misread this though, they know the game better then their employees do,they just hire people to do their work and that's that.

@richgirl

The sad thing is kiddo, if what you're saying is all true, you'll still be rich even if you don't do anything. You hire a couple of investors, sell your fathers company and voila, you'll live a much better life then the average 100x harder working immigrant family whilst doing absolutely nothing. You're a lucky person :/ 52

sgtpetey wrote this on 2010-08-29 02:21:05 Is it a nice house? Of course. If I had the money to throw away...I would probably demolish it and do something more useful with the property.

To richgirl3000:

I doubt your rich. IF you are, use some money and learn to spell. I think instead that your parents earn just enough money so you can spend all day on the computer. I wouldn't be surprised if you skip school so much you can't graduate.

If your lucky, you will be able to find some moron that you can enslave to work for you just because you have sex with him every now and then.

Good luck. 53

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