Bill Gates unloaded one of his properties in less than two weeks on the market—and it only cost $5 million
Having co-founded the world’s largest software company, Microsoft, Bill Gates is one of the richest people in the world, worth an estimated $152 billion, according to Forbes. While he and his ex-wife Melinda French Gates have donated a decent portion of their fortune through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (which still remains intact despite their divorce), they also acquired a handful of luxury properties across the U.S. during their 27-year marriage.
But Gates let one of his properties go recently. After less than two weeks on the market, his mid-century modern mansion in Medina, Wash., sold after it had been listed at just under $5 million, according to Re/Max, the real estate company that represented the home. The sales price of the home wasn’t released, and the realtor representing the property didn’t respond to requests for comment from Fortune.
The somewhat modest (by Gates’ standards) lakefront home is just 2,400 square feet with four bedrooms and three bathrooms. Gates bought the home, which was built in 1954, in 2003 for about $1.3 million, according to King County property records. Gates representatives didn’t respond to requests for comment from Fortune about why he had decided to sell the property.
This isn’t the only property that Gates owns in the Medina area, which overlooks Lake Washington. He also owns a 66,000-square foot mansion, nicknamed “Xanadu 2.0,” a riff on Charles Foster Kane’s home in the film Citizen Kane. Gates bought the Xanadu land in 1988 for just $2 million—but proceeded to pour about $63 million into the property—and now the entire estate is worth about $130 million. It has 24 bathrooms, but oddly just seven bedrooms.
Melinda Gates told Fortune in a 2008 interview that the property, which took a whopping seven years to complete, ended up being “a bachelor’s dream and a bride’s nightmare.” It includes several garages, a trampoline room, an indoor pool, a theater with a popcorn machine, and innumerable software and high-tech displays. Melinda even considered not moving in (as the project was underway during the early years of their marriage).
Other properties owned by Bill Gates
While the Medina mansion may seem like enough, Gates owns several other luxury properties across the U.S. It’s nearly impossible to tell exactly how many he may hold because some are listed under limited liability companies, like the $5 million lakehouse that just sold.
According to a 2021 Realtor.com report, Gates owns properties in Hobe Sound, Fla.; Wellington, Fla.; and Indian Wells, Calif. In 2020, the Gateses also purchased a $43 million property in Del Mar, Calif., which is a 5,800-square-foot residence with ocean views, six bedrooms, and two guesthouses, according to Realtor.com.
While Gates has spent millions of dollars on properties across the country, he and Melinda have given away more than $59 billion through their foundation following his early retirement from Microsoft.
“If you’d have asked me in my twenties if I’d ever retire early from Microsoft, I’d have told you that you were crazy,” he wrote in a 2019 Gates Note. “The world is more equitable now than it was then. But we’ve still got a long way to go.”
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