MW What happened to celebrity selling power? Why Hollywood's most famous struggle to unload their lavish homes.
By Lisa Johnson Mandell
A growing list of celebrity homes sit unsold for years, indicating a significant shift in the luxury market.
Many of Hollywood's A-listers have struggled to sell their opulent homes. Clockwise from top, Katherine Schwarzenegger and Chris Pratt, Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez, Kris Jenner, and Alec and Hilaria Baldwin.
For decades, fame seemed to be the only guarantee for a quick, splashy, and profitable home sale. A celebrity's ties to a property would create instant buzz-and served as a sure-fire tactic for luring in a line of prospective buyers.
But in recent years, that playbook seems to have faltered, leaving many of Hollywood's most famous faces in an uphill struggle to shift their opulent homes. Few stars seem to be immune to this trend, which has affected everyone from Chris Pratt and Katherine Schwarzenegger to Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck.
According to celebrity real estate broker and "Selling Sunset" star Jason Oppenheim, shifting an A-list home is not what it once was, thanks in large part to one key factor: the cachet of celebrity ownership alone simply doesn't hold the sway it once did, particularly when it comes to especially pricey properties.
What's more, Oppenheim-whose agency has worked with the likes of Kanye West, Harry Styles, and Meryl Streep-notes that celebrity clients often have some very "unrealistic" goals when it comes to their ideal sale price.
"Celebrity homes certainly do still sell, and perhaps even at a bit of a premium," he tells Realtor.com. "However, celebrities (and more often their business managers) can be particularly unrealistic about their initial asking prices, often causing multiple reductions and significant days on market. This perhaps creates the impression that celebrity homes don't sell."
Meryl Streep attends a premiere of "The Devil Wears Prada 2" in London on April 22, 2026.
He does not place the blame squarely on the shoulders of the stars and their managers, however.
"Listing agents are also culprits in this pattern, as they want to work with the celebrity and oblige their unrealistic expectations," he explains.
Overall, the growing list of celebrities who have spent years trying to unload their expansive abodes indicates a significant shift in the luxury market, Luxury Estate International agent Marianna Sullivan notes.
It is an evolution that Sullivan, who is based in star-studded Las Vegas, has witnessed well beyond Hollywood-and applies to wealthy buyers who are, these days, more focused on the quality of the property, rather than the star power of the A-listers who may have once lived there.
"Today's ultraluxury buyer is more focused on ease, functionality, quality, and long-term value, and is not just star-struck," she says.
Revealed: The most high-profile celebrity home sale struggles
Take Pratt and Schwarzenegger, for example, who have been trying to offload their custom Pacific Palisades mansion for three years-and have faced more than a few hurdles along the way.
Originally listed for $32 million in July 2023, the 13,000-square-foot home with a plethora of luxurious amenities has bounced on and off the market ever since, each time with a significant price reduction.
Katherine Schwarzenegger and Chris Pratt attend the premiere of Netflix's "The Electric State" in Los Angeles in 2025.
Last listed at the reduced price of $19.99 million, it has since been sidelined again, while the celeb couple and their children are reported to be staying in a Montecito mansion owned by fellow A-lister Katy Perry.
It's believed that buyers balked not only at the lofty original asking price, but also at the couple's decision to raze a landmark midcentury house to build the ultraglamorous mansion, ruffling the feathers of architecture-conscious Angelenos.
Affleck and Lopez have also had trouble selling the Beverly Hills estate they very publicly purchased together in 2023 for $60.8 million. Following the couple's separation in 2024, they listed the shared residence for about $68 million, apparently with no acceptable offers made.
Much like Schwarzengger and Pratt, the former couple made multiple attempts to offload their marital dwelling-which they are said to have spent millions renovating. Yet even after multiple price cuts, it lingers on the market.
Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez in 2022.
Interestingly, Affleck now seems to have washed his hands of the home altogether-with reports surfacing in April that the actor had gifted his ex his portion of the mansion, leaving her free to move ahead with marketing it solo.
Weeks later, she returned the 12-bedroom mansion to the market for the even lower price of $49.99 million, more than $10 million less than what she and Affleck paid for it. Only time will tell if the latest discount helps to move the needle on the 24-bathroom home with a private theater, spa, gym, and full sports complex on about 5 acres.
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Meanwhile, Alec and Hilaria Baldwin's Amagansett compound has been languishing on the market since 2022, when they listed it for $29 million. Today, it's priced at $19,950,000, after having undergone a few marketing strategies, among them hard social media pushes.
Alec Baldwin and Hilaria Baldwin in 2025 in New York City.
Some speculate that Alec's much-publicized legal problems from the fatal "Rust" filming accident (involving cinematographer Halyna Hutchins' death) have soured buyers on his Hamptons home, despite his full exoneration in the 2025 trial. Others have suggested that the older style and inland location did not appeal to buyers seeking contemporary, turnkey homes near the ocean.
In addition, Michael Jordan's storied Chicago mansion, complete with personalized gates bearing his jersey number "23," was finally sold in 2024 for only $9.5 million, after 13 years and multiple relistings, down from $29 million.
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The home's very specific branding, once thought to be a selling point, limited its appeal to wealthy superfans, rather than typical luxury buyers. The buyer hoped to capitalize on superfan enthusiasm, but has yet to be successful with that. He's tried turning it into a luxury timeshare, put it on the luxury rental market, and even listed it on Airbnb $(ABNB)$.
Also, music legend Billy Joel has had double trouble selling his illustrious estates.
Billy Joel
His Palm Beach compound languished for six years and required $22 million in price cuts before it was sold, while his sprawling Oyster Bay compound on Long Island was recently taken off the market. Originally listed in 2023 for just under $50 million, the home was reduced in price to $29.9 million.
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Other celebrities, including Kris Jenner, Joy Behar, and Cara Delevingne, have also listed properties that stagnated on the market for years.
"Inherent in listings like this is there's an assumption that an association with a celebrity brings a premium," said longtime appraiser Jonathan Miller. "And in a market like Manhattan or the Hamptons, that simply isn't supported by empirical data."
"People aren't paying a premium in general for an apartment because an actor lived there," added Compass $(COMP)$ broker Pamela D'Arc. "It still matters how you price and how you market something."
Many celebrity homes that languish on the market are caused by overpricing, as in the Baldwins' case, or over-personalization, as with Jordan's sports palace.
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But other factors are at play as well. High-profile markets like Los Angeles, Miami, and the Hamptons all have an oversupply of $15 million to $30 million estates. At those levels, buyers can commission their own dream homes instead of retrofitting someone else's fantasy.
Carrying costs are also an issue-massive properties are burdened by soaring taxes-especially in markets like Los Angeles, where the mansion tax hinders high-end sales. There are also sky-high maintenance and staffing expenses, which may inhibit even the wealthiest buyers.
This story originally ran on Realtor.com.
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June 03, 2026 05:04 ET (09:04 GMT)
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