There’s no Mickey Mousing around this one. Gary Kreisel, a former Walt Disney Co. executive, recently bought a home in Santa Monica for $2.8 million.
Kreisel served as president of Glendale-based Walt Disney TV animation, which was formed in 1985. He was also the president of live-action TV and music publishing for Disney. He was hired by DreamWorks SKG in January 1996 to head its TV animation unit.
The 4,175-square-foot Mediterranean has four bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms. Redesigned by Robert Ramirez in 1993, the original 1924 home includes Ramirez’s signature indoor-outdoor lifestyle features. It has a large kitchen with a center island, a fireplace in the family room and built-in bookshelves throughout. The prestigious north of Montana residence has a large office and staircase leading to a writer’s nook-meditation room. A rooftop deck provides a partial ocean view.
Charles Pence, John Hathorn and Loraine Silver at Coldwell Banker in Santa Monica listed the property.
Making Good
I’m a soft touch for immigrants who come to America and find the streets paved with gold. Truth is it just doesn’t happen like that much anymore. So kudos to Sey Jung, born 63 years ago in what is now North Korea. In his youth, his family lived in squalor. Now, he has listed his Malibu home at $2.6 million.
Sey Jung worked for a Korean airline that transferred him to Los Angeles in 1976 as a revenue auditor. He left that job four years later to open a grocery market in Los Angeles, a business he ran for 15 years while getting his real estate and contractor’s licenses. He went on to develop shopping centers and apartment complexes.
He has been semiretired since 2008.
The ocean-view home he is selling has five bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms in 4,138 square feet. The grounds around the traditional Spanish-style home are landscaped with palms, pines and olive trees. There are three fireplaces and the master suite has a private deck. There is also an attached guest house-office and a lower-level bonus room.
Madison Hildebrand of Coldwell Banker Malibu is the listing agent.
Foreclosure Move
Paula Kent Meehan, co-founder of Redken Laboratories, picked up a foreclosed home in Malibu for $1.5 million. The house sold for $2.4 million in September 2005.
Meehan bought the three-bedroom, two-bath home from the Bank of America National Trust and Savings Association, which had foreclosed on the property in September. The 2,593-square-foot house was built in 1976.
Meehan co-founded her line of hair care and beauty products with hair dresser Jeri Redding in 1960. Prior to that, she was an actress and model.
Redken is owned by L’Oreal Group. In 2007, it was named as one of the Icons of the American Marketplace, a shared honor with 256 other U.S. brands out of 800 nominated.
Rocket Science
The buyer in a $35 million Beverly Hills sale is widely presumed to be movie studio head Jeffrey Katzenberg. Never mind that. The seller was Simon Ramo, the “R” in TRW and the father of – yowza! – the intercontinental ballistic missile. What did Katzenberg ever do compared to that? “Shrek”?
Physicist and engineer Ramo, now 96, led the development of microwave and missile technology. He helped create two Fortune 500 companies in the 1970s: TRW and Bunker-Ramo, now part of Honeywell.
He led research at General Electric and was director of research for Hughes Aircraft. Working with the U.S. Air Force, Ramo helped develop the Atlas rocket – the launch vehicle for NASA’s Project Mercury orbital missions – including John Glenn’s historic Friendship 7 flight.
In 1983, Ramo was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Reagan. Now, Shrek is cute and all, but …
Details about the house are as sketchy as whether Katzenberg was really the buyer. It’s big, gated and wasn’t listed for sale in the MLS. Ramo reportedly let it be known he’d be interested in selling in summer 2009.
Ann Brenoff can be reached at [email protected]
