Following the death of Hugh Hefner Wednesday, the fate of his swinging Los Angeles party pad, known as the Playboy Mansion, is now in the hands of its current owner — Hefner's wealthy next-door neighbor.
Daren Metropoulos, 33, scion of the Connecticut billionaire Dean Metropoulos and the co-owner of Twinkies-maker Hostess Brands, bought the sprawling, 20,000-square-foot home in August 2016. He paid a reported $100 million, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Terms of the sale included allowing Hefner to continue to live in the famed Holmby Hills mansion until his death, a representative for Metropoulos said at the time.
The home, designed by architect Arthur R. Kelly in 1927, was originally listed at $200 million, a number local real estate agents then called ridiculously overpriced. Hefner had paid $1.1 million for the property in 1971 Metropoulos purchased a property adjacent to the mansion in 2009 for $18 million.
It is not clear if Metropoulos plans to make any changes or renovations to the Playboy estate, which is also among a select number of L.A. homes to have a zoo license, but his company said in a statement that he would connect the two properties, ultimately returning the combined 7.3-acre compound to the original vision executed by noted architect Arthur R. Kelly and its first owner, Arthur Letts, Jr., the department store heir whose father conceived and developed Holmby Hills when it was the Wolfskill Ranch."
The mansion, the scene of countless celebrity-filled parties and innumerable tales of sexual shenanigans, sits on five acres and has 29 rooms, including a game house, home theatre, wine cellar, gym, tennis court, swimming pool and four-bedroom guest house.
Metropoulos, who grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut, and attended the University of Connecticut, said in a statement Thursday that he simply wanted to remember his neighbor and friend as "a visionary in business, a giant in media and an iconic figure of pop culture whose legacy will leave a lasting impact," NBC News reported.
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It was unclear how much of Hefner's fortune would go to his wife, Crystal Harris. US Weekly reported in 2013 that she had signed an "ironclad" prenup before marrying the publisher.
