It was the first of three Los Angeles estates the movie mogul built—the biggest of which is owned by Taylor Swift, who restored it and won landmark status
4 min
Taylor Swift took on the role of preservationist when she bought and restored a Beverly Hills mansion built for movie mogul Samuel Goldwyn—and if she’s looking for a new project, another century-old Goldwyn estate just hit the market asking $3.495 million.
The 1916 Spanish-style villa was built for the Polish-born producer in the Hollywood foothills of Runyon Canyon, a little-known artist enclave with a rich legacy. It was a starter home for Goldwyn, who eventually bought two other properties in Los Angeles as part of the so-called Goldwyn trifecta, according to listing agent Ingrid Sacerio of the Agency, who listed the home last week.
The two other homes include an Italianate mansion built a couple blocks away by Los Angeles developer E.F. Fuller (it sold in 2022 for $6.4 million), and the grand Georgian Revival mansion in Beverly Hills that Swift bought in 2016 for $25 million before launching a campaign to have it officially landmarked . She still owns the home.
Should Swift (or anyone else) wish to flex their conservation muscles, the Hollywood property already boasts original architectural details, including the windows, interior doors and oak floors throughout. A triptych sculpture from the 1928 “Cleopatra” movie set and other artefacts and fountains dot the landscaped grounds.
Sacerio said it also has a lucky legacy: Soon after moving in, Goldwyn co-founded MGM and began producing acclaimed films of the 1930s and ’40s, including “Stella Dallas,” “Wuthering Heights,” and “Little Foxes,” and hit musicals such as “Guys and Dolls,” starring Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra, and “Porgy and Bess.”
The neighbourhood “was a magnet for silent movie stars back in the day,” said seller Shel Pink, who is an artist, author of the self-care book “Slow Beauty” and the founder of beauty-product brand SpaRitual. She purchased the house in 2015 with musician Ran Pink. “One of the houses across the street was reputedly owned by one who had parties that lasted for days.”
Pink said the history of the neighbourhood was a significant draw. “Everyone knows about the music scene in Laurel Canyon but not about this little enclave in Runyon Canyon, which has attracted writers like Joan Didion, who rented here in the 1970s, and other creative types over the decades.”
She was also drawn to the house’s Old Hollywood history and its location on the hill. “We are slightly above but not so high that we have to drive down steep, winding roads, so it’s super accessible,” Pink said.
The 3,398-square-foot residence sits on a corner lot and features four bedrooms and three bathrooms. A separate studio with its own entrance is adjacent to the two-car garage at the rear of the property.
Upstairs, the primary bedroom now incorporates what was once a neighbouring sunroom with a vaulted ceiling and semi-circle, or half-sun, windows; a previous owner added a ceiling-mounted curtain that Pink says can be drawn to block out the morning sun or to keep the sleeping area cool during the day. Two more bedrooms (one en-suite) are on this level.
The fourth bedroom with a walk-in closet on the ground floor is currently used as a den. A designated office overlooks the dining room, which flows into a living room on one side and the kitchen on the other—all enclosed with expansive windows and glass doors, allowing light to flood the interior, Pink said.
A tall fence surrounds the entire property, which is further protected with double gates—a two-door pedestrian gate along the street and another leading into the porch outside the front door, both customised by the previous owner, Pink said.
The garage’s location at the rear of the property provides additional privacy. “No one ever sees anyone coming and going out of the front gate,” Sacerio said. Instead, they pull into the garage, walk across a pebbled area, up a few steps to a patio with a hot tub, and into the breakfast nook in the kitchen.
A landscaped brick pathway circumnavigates the perimeter of the property, crossing a patio with an outdoor fireplace and ending in steps leading down to a long, narrow pool.
“From the moment you enter the gardens and see the ivy walls, there’s a poetry and a wildness here—I like to say that we have our own mini forest that hugs the home and creates a serene oasis in the middle of an urban environment,” Pink said. “It feels like a secluded retreat. Everyone comments on the beautiful energy and sense of calm as soon as they step inside.”
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Georgetown agent Jamie Peva blends history and real estate on Instagram, turning local stories into a powerful sales strategy.
5 min
On a recent morning in Georgetown—Washington, D.C.’s oldest neighborhood—real-estate agent Jamie Peva strode down leafy N Street, brimming with historical tidbits.
Jackie Kennedy once lived on the street, he said. So did Ben Bradlee, former executive editor of the Washington Post, along with a former Miss America and a powerful U.S. Senator. Bradlee’s widow, author Sally Quinn, and Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google, own stately homes there.
“I’ve seen a picture of Lyndon Johnson coming out of this house,” said Peva, passing a Federal-style brick mansion. “Also, the Beatles went to a lawn party here.”
Peva, a 60-year-old agent with Washington Fine Properties, has sold Georgetown real estate for over three decades, often traversing the neighborhood by bicycle. Of the roughly 2,500 houses in the historic neighborhood, he has been involved in the sale of 460, he estimated. A self-styled historian of the neighborhood, he knows stories behind its houses and their owners going back generations.
With a knack for lively storytelling, he shares his knowledge with some 37,500 Instagram followers, who have made Peva—sporting the bow ties he has worn since boarding school—an unlikely social-media influencer. Many of his followers are locals, and most have no plans to buy or sell real estate—until they do. It is then, according to Peva, that his spirited reels bring him to mind.
“It’s the digital version of a refrigerator magnet,” he said.
After Peva’s first video in November 2023, his eponymous Instagram account sparked a 10% increase in sales volume in the first year, and another 20% the next, he estimated. “It’s been very good for business, there is no question about it,” he said.
But Peva’s posts have also made him a local celebrity. As he walked down N street, the driver of a Mercedes station wagon slowed down to honk and wave. A lady walking a large dark gray dog stopped to ask what he was filming that day (a reel about a Colonial-era bottling plant.) Peva knew the dog from walking his two springers, Jumpy and Peggy-O, in the neighborhood.
“I need to make a video about the pooches of Georgetown,” he mused.
A growing number of real-estate agents now use social media to sell, and some have millions of followers with reels featuring ultraluxury pads, selling tips or reality TV-style reports on their daily lives. While Peva posts about his listings—and sometimes those of other agents—he mostly focuses on Georgetown history, local businesses and community events, saying his goal is to benefit both his business and the neighborhood.
“If we don’t find something genuinely interesting and worth sharing, we won’t do it,” said Peva’s daughter, Violet Peva, a New York social-media strategist who films, edits and posts his reels. “We cover many topics, not just real-estate information.”
Peva is originally from Connecticut, but has lived in Georgetown for over 30 years, currently in a cottage-style house with a white picket fence. Over the years, Georgetown has changed. The Georgetown Set, a powerful group of Cold War-era residents whose Sunday-night potluck dinners are said to have swayed U.S. policy, has long faded away. The community is still home to high-profile Washingtonians, including a Republican senator and several cabinet members. But it increasingly also attracts technology and finance executives, according to Peva. He now routinely signs nondisclosure agreements, ensuring privacy for wealthy clients. The shift has made him rethink his marketing approach.
“For years, a big part of our Georgetown business was made up of people who maintained a low profile,” he said. Real-estate agents were similarly low-key. Today, curb appeal is more important, he said, and agents are promoting themselves more. “As this change was underfoot, I was thinking that I needed to evolve myself too,” he said.
Though his own social-media use is mostly limited to following sailing accounts, he asked his daughter to help him post his listings online. Violet, now 26, started coming to D.C. once a month to film his reels. After an early video, on a condominium building called the Elliott, her sister Fern called her to report: “Daddy’s blowing up on Instagram,” Violet recalled. The reel got over 50,000 views. The next two each drew over 300,000. Peva’s most popular post ever, with over 838,000 views, was about the Grateful Dead playing in Georgetown. Sometimes, Peva interviews Georgetowners such as Quinn, the author, or Jamie Stachowski, the owner of a local butcher shop.
Peva, who majored in history in college, now spends up to two hours a day on research, usually in the morning while on his stationery bike. Online, he pores over old newspapers or the Library of Congress website, and he has a collection of articles and books—in and out of print—about Georgetown.
Companies often approach Peva for promotional posts, he said, but he turns them down, feeling that followers would lose interest in constant commercials. One exception is a recent paid post on Mount Vernon, the former home of George Washington. Peva wanted to share its history, he said, and didn’t want to lose the opportunity to another Instagrammer.
Anthony Arend, a professor at Georgetown University, has lived in his current home for 19 years without any plans to sell or buy real estate. But he follows Peva and often likes his posts.
“He is very charismatic, he is energetic, and he obviously knows a lot about the community,” said Arend, who has referred house-hunting friends to Peva.
One of Peva’s biggest deals—the $10.5 million sale of a 19th-century Italianate mansion—came after he made two 2024 reels featuring the property. In March, he sold the longtime O Street home of Tim and Jane Matz for $5.8 million after featuring it on his Instagram. Peva had showed them the home 25 years earlier, with Violet in a baby carrier on his back.
Last year, Kate Watts, 49, a digital consultant, called Peva to sell her late father’s three-bedroom house on Q Street; her husband had seen Peva on Instagram. In an October reel, Peva praised the architecture of the house, designed by modernist Hugh Newell Jacobsen. Halfway through, he mentioned an open house the next day, ending with an upbeat: “Did I also mention this house is for sale? $3.75 million!” The reel got 27,000 views, the open house was packed, and the buyers made an offer at the list price on the same day.
