The Nation's Most Avid Trophy-Home Buyer? WSJ

How the software billionaire, Larry Ellison,  has taken serial property buying to new extremes...Real-estate observers say Mr. Ellison is known for getting what he wants, pursuing properties he's interested in regardless of whether or not they are on the market. "Larry's philosophy has always been, 'Buy the best, without compromise,' " says Kurt Rappaport, co-founder of the Westside Estate Agency, who represented Mr. Ellison in several of the Malibu deals.

One of the nation's most voracious consumers of trophy real estate is back on the hunt.Since the mid-1990s, software billionaire Larry Ellison has accumulated hundreds of millions of dollars worth of top-shelf properties around the world. The portfolio of Oracle Corp.'s co-founder includes five adjacent lots in Malibu, Calif.; a Newport, R.I., mansion formerly owned by the Astor family; a historic garden property in Kyoto and an estate in Rancho Mirage, Calif., with a private, 19-hole golf course.The list of serial buyers of trophy properties, while thinning in recent years, includes Paul Allen along with Roman Abramovich and other Russian oligarchs. Mr. Ellison has a distinctive buying pattern: When he finds an area he likes, he takes a flood-the-zone approach. He often buys several adjacent properties to combine into a single sprawling compound. At the same time, he acquires other noncontiguous properties nearby, increasing his overall holdings in a desirable area.
By Sarah Tilton and Juliet Chung, Oct. 21, 11 WSJ

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