Rihanna apparently caused a big stir by skipping the 2021 Grammy awards, leaving the spotlight to other music superstars like Beyoncé, Billie Eilish and Taylor Swift. Reports said the Barbadian singer’s absence was due to not being nominated — and then there’s the pesky fact that her much-anticipated upcoming album “R9” still has yet to surface, despite being years in the works. Of course, Rihanna’s also been busy with other things, too, like becoming a retail mogul. Sales of the burgeoning cosmetics tycoon’s Fenty Beauty makeup line have gone bonkers, and her Savage x Fenty lingerie brand is now reportedly valued at a whopping $1 billion.
The Grammys skip might also have something to do with the fact that Rihanna recently found residential love in a not-so-hopeless place. The singer has just acquired a new house — a $13.8 million mansion, to be exact — and the property is located on a highly coveted cul-de-sac in the mountains above Beverly Hills. Neighbors include Sir Paul McCartney, and a few doors away lies a sumptuous estate that was leased for several years to Mariah Carey, and was more recently rented by Madonna during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Originally built in the 1930s, the Rihanna estate was formerly owned by Mary Sheldon, the daughter of “I Dream of Jeanie” creator Sidney Sheldon. In 2016, Sheldon sold the dated house for $4.3 million to entrepreneur and investor Daniel Starr, whose acquisition of the property was chronicled on Bravo’s “Million Dollar Listing.”
Starr subsequently spent millions to demolish and rebuild nearly every inch of the house (and he would later sue his contractors for those millions, alleging fraud and shoddy workmanship.) Last year, the property was put up for sale, asking $15 million. The transfer to Rihanna appears to have gone down off-market, but the “Umbrella” empress forked over $13.8 million for the premises, according to tax records.