The Ruins of Liam Hemsworth’s Former Malibu Home Quietly Sell

 

Hollywood heartthrob Liam Hemsworth has quietly sold a Malibu property ravaged by the 2018 Woolsey Fire.

“It’s been a heartbreaking few days,” Mr. Hemsworth wrote on his social media almost exactly two years ago, next to a photo of the decimated home that was reduced to ashes save for a fireplace and remnants of a few walls. “...my heart goes out to everyone who was affected by these fires.”

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Two years later, Mr. Hemsworth, 30, has apparently decided to sell rather than rebuild. The trust through which he owned the home quietly closed an off-market deal last month, selling the 7.4-acre lot for $3.6 million, according to a deed filed with Los Angeles County on Oct. 13.

Only wreckage remains from the Woolsey Fire.The mystery buyer was a Wyoming-based limited liability company, public records show. It’s not known which or whether any real estate agencies were involved in the deal.

Before the fires, Mr. Hemsworth lived at the tony Malibu home, a landlocked three-bedroom, three-bathroom house at the base of the Santa Monica Mountains, with his then-wife, singer Miley Cyrus, according to Variety, which first reported the sale. The pair have since split.

The transfer marks a significant, but not unsurprising, loss in value for the destroyed property. It last traded hands in 2014, as a handsome steel-and-glass ranch with a pool and acres of wooded land, for more than $6.81 million—nearly double its October sale price.

In the wake of Woolsey, Mr. Hemsworth hinted at rebuilding. “I love you Malibu,” he wrote on Twitter in November 2018. “Thank you to all the hero firefighters around California. It’s going to be a journey to rebuild.”

But the property is little changed since he posted the devastating photo.

Aerial shots from Google Earth capture the harrowing losses on Ramirez Canyon Road. Stills taken the month Woolsey ripped through the neighborhood are obscured by the smoke followed a couple months later by a clear view of the wreckage. Little that can be identified remains except the pool and the charred framework of the neighboring pergola. A brick fireplace and chimney stack, impenetrable to the blaze, still rise from the center of the ruins in the latest Google aerial shots, dating to spring 2019.

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Building records show minimal work was done to the site ahead of the sale. Only two building permits were issued since the fire, including for basic debris clearance and excavation, according to building records with the City of Malibu—meaning the mystery buyer certainly has work cut out for them.