She may be the gal to whom The Chainsmokers’ Drew Taggart famously told “Baby pull me closer in the backseat of your Rover that I know you can’t afford … pull the sheets right off the corner of the mattress that you stole from your roommate back in Boulder“, but the real-life Halsey is a very wealthy young woman who likely can pay cash for just about any new Range Rover model she desires (except perhaps for the $199,950 Range Rover SVAutobiography, but that’s really more of a Kylie Jenner special, in any case) and she can probably afford several California King mattresses, too. Want proof? She just forked out $2,230,000 for a luxurious Hollywood Hills house. How many 22-year-olds do you know that can keep up with that?
But look, we’re already getting ahead of ourselves. A few weeks ago, our friend Vlad the Revealer of Celebrity Address Aerial fame contacted us with a request to look into the ownership of an interesting-looking contemporary house near the tippy-top of celeb-popular Beachwood Canyon. The property recently transferred for the aforementioned $2,230,000 and was acquired by a mysterious blind trust that keeps the owner’s true identity locked up nice and tight.
But after a little slappin’ and screamin’, it wasn’t long before Yolanda discovered that the buyer is a young lass named Ashley Frangipane. Better-known to young popular music lovers around the globe as Halsey, of course.
Before we get to the house, a brief bio: Miss Frangipane — whose surname Yolanda rather loves — was born in New Jersey to a working-class family and raised primarily in Jersey and New York City. Miss Frangipane’s father is black and her mother is white. (Yolanda only mentions that last part because Miss Frangipane described herself in 2015 as tri-bi: biracial, bisexual, and bipolar. Well, alrighty then).
The musically-inclined Miss Frangipane began posting videos of herself performing covers of hit songs sometime in the 2012/2013 time frame. In 2014 — at that point a community college dropout — Miss Frangipane recorded a song entitled “Ghost” which she posted online and which subsequently received millions of views. She signed a record deal with Astralwerks and subsequently released an EP, which gained her further attention.
The year 2015 marked the beginning of the apex of Miss Frangipane’s early career, as she began touring as an opening act for big-name artists (like Imagine Dragons) and released her debut album, Badlands, which eventually went gold.
It wasn’t until the latter part of 2016, however, that Miss Frangipane struck literal gold (well, kinda) with the song Closer. If any of y’all have never heard it, you probably live under a rock the size of Mt. Vesuvias (or maybe inside Mt. Vesuvias) because the song became one of the biggest pop music hits in recent years, spending twelve consecutive weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 and a mind-bending 32 weeks in the chart’s top 10, which ties the all-time record. It was equally massive internationally and ended up going to #1 in about 200 other countries or some equally silly amount. It’s got more than 1.6 billion views on the YouTube and more than a billion streams on Spotify.
And yes, even old Yolanda has heard the song. And we admit to liking it — the first dozen times we heard it, at least. What? It’s damn catchy.
Keep in mind that Miss Frangipane is only featured on Closer, she ain’t the main artist (The Chainsmokers). But more importantly, she is credited as a co-writer on the song. And as anyone familiar with the music industry will tell y’all, songwriting is where the really big bucks are. Just ask Taylor Swift or Beyonce. Yolanda imagines that the royalties from Closer alone will be enough to give the very young Miss Frangipane a comfortable life for the rest of her days. Or at least enough to pay $2.23 million for hillside house.
Miss Frangipane’s new crib is rather remotely located just below the Hollywood Sign and above a riotous maze of narrow, dead-end streets. Like many Hollywood Hills homes, the structure sits hard-up on the street, but the living spaces are tucked away behind gates and tall hedges. Only the two-car garage door is visible from out front, perfect for a celebrity like our gurl.
Guests entering through the front door will either be wowed or sickened by the dizzying array of steps, wooden beams, and hues of grey and brown presented to their eyes. Kiddies, we like open floor plans and all, but this one is way too busy or maximalist or something for our delicate tastes.
Or maybe it’s the color scheme? It vaguely makes us recall man-cave or fancy frat house. Hmmm.
Listing materials say the “kitchen is perfect for entertaining” and it certainly has plenty of space and light. But it comes across as a bit frigid and sterile to your gurl. And all that wonky geometry would not help keep our daily liquid lunch down. Not one bit!
Like most other rooms of the house, the master bedroom is “interesting” with its vaulted ceiling and walls of glass opposite a rather incongruous window seat. (Yolanda actually likes this space). The master bathroom has poured concrete vanity that actually looks way better than it sounds. And while all the rage is over glass-walled shower, Miss Frangipane’s new place appears to take it one step further with a completely wall-less shower. Goodness — what will these peeps think of next?
There are a total of 4 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms in the 2,490-square-foot house.
Various doorways and a flight of stairs lead out back to the irregularly-shaped pool. Due to the sloping natures of the hillside land, the .18-acre lot doesn’t have much of a backyard, but there is a thick privacy hedge back here too and an outdoor bbq/kitchen area. Yolanda wonders if the architect might’ve been on acid when he did up this place — we’re just sayin’.
It is Yolanda’s understanding that Miss Frangipane currently resides in this house with another young woman named Payton Selzer, a gal whom Yolanda knows little about other than there are some silly online rumors that she had a long-ago fling with none other than Harry Styles.
But we digress. Prior to purchasing her new Beachwood Canyon house, Yolanda happens to know that Miss Frangipane lived with a male Norwegian music producer known as Lido in a leased house on a Sherman Oaks hillside, on a street that lies just off Mulholland Drive. Property records show that house — a flat-roofed and updated but otherwise unremarkable mid-century modern — has 3 beds and 3 baths in 2,479-square-feet of living space and was recently re-listed for the rental sum of $7,495 per month.
Yolanda congratulates Miss Frangipane on being able to afford a multi-million dollar spread at only 22 years of age. Now have some sense, gurlie, and don’t be stealin’ any more mattresses. You’re a big gurl and now you’ve got the moolah to step up to Williams-Sonoma. Oh, and pay off that damn Range Rover.
Listing agents: Monty Beisel & Dustin Cumming, Hilton & Hyland
Halsey’s agent: Joshua Myler, The Agency