SELLERS: Galen and Jenna Gering
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,695,000
SIZE: 2,205 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms
YOUR MAMA’S NOTES: A private oasis tucked up into the historic Hollywood Dell neighborhood that’s owned by veteran soap opera stud Galen Gering has come available with an asking price of $1.695 million. Mister Gering, who shook his gym-toned moneymaker on “Passions” before he landed his current, long-standing role on “Days of Our Lives,” acquired the two-parcel property in September 2000 for $754,500 according to property records. Mister Galen’s Hollywood Hills house was launched into pop cultural history in 2009 as the rented residence where once promising starlet turned over-exposed tabloid train wreck Lindsay Lohan lived when she was burgled by the infamous Bling Ring who reportedly made off with around $130,000 worth of clothing and jewelry.
A gated and camera-secured courtyard — shown in a black and white surveillance video of the ballsy, celeb-obsessed teen-aged thieves as they attempted to break in — leads the main entrance to the two-story, 1927 Spanish Revival-style residence that listing details and other online resources indicate has three bedrooms and four bathrooms in a fairly modest 2,205-square-feet. The central entrance gallery and stair hall leads to a roomy living room with fireplace, notably high and beamed ceiling, and four sets of French doors that open to wrought iron railed Juliet balconies. An adjoining sun porch with terra-cotta tile floors and over-the-treetops canyon view does double-duty as a den/TV watching lounge and the dining room is open to an up-to-date kitchen that features wood beams on the ceiling, a functional mix of ceramic tile and butcher block counter tops, the usual array of de rigueur stainless steel appliances, and a cozy, built-in in banquette dining area.
Artfully terraced and lushly landscaped gardens are described in marketing materials as “a private, mystical Shangri-la of luxe sophistication in the heart of the city” and incorporate numerous verandas and patios. The lower level master bedroom opens to secluded stone terrace with sunken hot tub and French doors in the upper level dining room open to a trellis-shaded patio with cushioned built-in bench seating from where fireworks shot off at the nearby Hollywood Bowl can be viewed. There’s also a spacious dining deck beneath a behemoth banyan, a lounge area nestled into a shady bamboo grove and, set at a photogenic distance from the house amid a riotous thicket of tropical foliage, what listings call an “open air Bohemian Pole house that’s straight from Fiji or Bora Bora.” Listing photographs show the charming and inviting pole house/garden cabana, from wherever it may hail, is outfitted with a TV surmounted fireplace and includes a ladder-accessed loft area perfect for an al fresco sleep out.
Property records that Mister Gering and his long-time wife, model turned bit part actress Jenna Gering, also own a 1920s Spanish Revival-style residence with five bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms plus a detached guesthouse on a pretty, pine tree-lined block in a decidedly desirable section of Santa Monica that was acquired in late 2003 for $1.435 million and, according to the digital evidence we turned up, set out for lease over the summer of 2015 with an asking price of $16,500 per month.
Listing photos: ACME Real Estate
