Celebrity side-hustle: Flipping houses makes millions for stars

When they’re not making music or movies, they’re having flippin’ fun.

Forbes is reporting a bevy of celebrities are using their access to cash and popularity to make a killing on their side hustle of buying, fixing up, then selling homes.

Long time flipper Annetta Powell, who literally wrote the book on flipping homes titled “Finding, Fixing and Flipping Properties” told the publication that more and more of Hollywood’s royalty are making big profits on their homes thanks to their name recognition, money on hand, and access to media outlets looking to report on their every move.

That upper hand allows them to make more money than your run-of-the-mill home flipper — by a lot.

“The average real estate flipper can make upwards of $50,000 per house,” Powell told the publication. “But A-list celebrities have access to enough funds to play the game at the higher levels, making a $15 million profit on a $40 million property still aligns with the percentage earnings expected in the industry.”

That big profit was the result of the latest flip by talk-show-host Ellen DeGeneres and wife Portia De Rossi, who have become known for flipping homes — and making big money in the process.

One celeb who has followed in DeGeneres’ footsteps includes “Friends” star Jennifer Aniston, whose recent hustle involved her Beverley Hills mansion she purchased for $13.5 million, renovated, had featured in Architectural Digest magazine, then sold for $35 million.

Aniston also sold a Bel Air Mansion she purchased with her ex-husband Justin Theroux for $75 million, more than tripling the $21 million investment.

Other pop-culture figures who have made a killing on real estate include former NBA superstar Shaquille O’Neal, who started investing in real estate during his playing days and has since created his own real estate investment firm the O’Neal Group.

Then, there’s the rapper Vanilla Ice — also known as Rob Van Winkle — who stopped, collaborated and listed to a number of deals that turned him into a real estate tycoon, and landed him as a host on the DIY network’s “The Vanilla Ice Project,” which ran for nine seasons between 2010 and 2019, and the new “Vanilla Ice Home Show.”

[Forbes] — Vince DiMiceli