Driving the Pacific Coast Highway is among the ultimate California experiences: ocean and beach on one side, towering mountains and ragged cliffs on the other.
To traverse the PCH today, though, is to be reminded of the firestorms that swept across Southern California in January. The ocean still glimmers blue, but it’s lined with charred cement where houses once towered along the water. The mountains still stand, but they’re dotted with blackened palm trees and orange-clad construction workers facilitating repairs.
Add to that the new emergency 25-mile per hour speed limit enacted because of the ongoing roadside work, and what was once a tranquil trek is now more of a beleaguered journey.
But if you make it out of that stretch, you’ll find yourself at Serra Retreat, a gated neighborhood home to the likes of Dick Van Dyke.
Beyond the gatehouse, there are no signs of a fire. Instead, elaborate mansions are tucked along a winding road offering panoramic views of the PCH and the coastline.
Among those mansions is the Villa di Vita Bella — a nearly 8,400-square-foot estate that sits behind imposing iron gates.
“You’re not looked onto from anyone on the beach, you’re not overlooked by the PCH, you don’t have any of the road noise,” Edward Hutchinson, a real estate agent with Compass’ Smith and Berg group, said in an interview with Homes.com. “It’s kind of this like, hidden gem. Everyone always drives past the entrance to Serra Retreat, and no one really knows it’s there.”
The five-bedroom, nine-bathroom house officially hit the public market last week with a close to $30 million price tag after about nine months of unadvertised, off-market offerings.
Agents F. Ron Smith and David Berg also hold the listing.
A silver-clad villa with panoramic views of the Pacific coast
Unlike Malibu, the villa was unscathed by the fires.
The home is set back on a gravel driveway adorned with a luscious garden and steep hedges. Its front doors open to a high-ceilinged foyer with crystal chandeliers and a marble staircase.
Through there, the home opens to the kitchen, a library and a television room.
“Everything in it is marble; they’ve got imported fireplaces from Italy,” Hutchinson said of the property. “It’s one of those almost timeless now architectural designs, that Mediterranean style, but they’ve actually updated everything in the property.”
From there, tall, arched glass doors open to the rest of the property, touting a view of the infinity edge pool, championship-size tennis court, guest house, gym and Point Dume, the westernmost part of the Santa Monica Bay.
“You have the sunsets that come down over Point Dume or over the ocean,” Hutchinson explained, “and then, from the primary suite, you have a view looking back towards L.A. So you kind of have the queen’s necklace side to side.”
Hutchinson noted that in addition to the view, the tennis court is a big draw because it has lights — a feature now forbidden in the area due to pushback from residents. More than that, beyond the court and the one-bedroom guest house, there’s a fully functional garden that the sellers use to grow and harvest food.
That said, “maintaining the property is very expensive,” according to Hutchinson. “But it’s something [the owners] really loved.”
Other features of the home include a basement movie theatre, an 800-bottle wine cellar and a hand-painted mural by artist James Goldcrown.
Selling a $30 million home next to a burn zone
The sellers are Susan B. Noyes, founder of Make It Better Media Group and the Make It Better Foundation, and her husband. The couple bought the home in 2020 as a retreat from the chilly winters in Chicago during the pandemic, Hutchinson said.
Since then, the estate has served as a family getaway. But with eight children — and grandchildren — the Noyes need a bigger home, and they’re not sure if they’ll have the time to get to Malibu either, according to Hutchinson.
Typically, it doesn’t take too long to sell a home in the neighborhood. Homes.com data showed that homes in Serra Retreat sell after about 34 days on the market, lower than the national average of 52 days. In the greater Malibu area, that number is slightly higher at 76 days.
This year’s fires, though, have presented a challenge.
For one, there’s the general risk of fire in Malibu. The villa was spared from the Palisades Fire because it was already in a burn scar from the Franklin Fire last December.
“It was a weird blessing in disguise,” Hutchinson said. “That burn scar actually stopped anything from progressing into Malibu.”
In other words, it has come face-to-face with two wildfires in the last year.
Then, there’s the matter of navigating the state of Malibu — and making it an appealing sale.
“The ingress and egress into Malibu on the PCH is still a bit challenging and it’s a little bit jarring because of what you’re going to see to and from the property,” Smith, another of the listing agents, said in an interview with Homes.com. “The beauty and the peace [at the property] is juxtaposed to what you’re seeing coming in off PCH, and I think that’s one of the challenges that we’ve just got to deal with.”