You probably didn't need yet another example of how the mega-rich seem to get more free stuff at exactly the point when they can afford to buy anything they want, but you're going to get one anyway. This time it's the creator the massively popular computer game Minecraft, who was treated to a dinner valued at $5,000 by two realtors from Williams & Williams in order to seal the deal on a Beverly Hills mansion with a price tag of $70 million.
That $70 million got the father of Minecraft, Markus Persson, 23,000 square feet of luxury that proved to be too rich even for Jay Z and Beyonce's blood, after Persson is rumored to have outbid the famous couple. Those bragging rights are only the beginning of the value packed into this mansion, though: It also comes with eight bedrooms, fifteen bathrooms, and an infinity pool. There were also a few bonus furnishings throughout the house at the time of purchase, like a Bentley living room set valued at $500,000, and a wine cellar stocked with Dom Perignon.
Branden Williams and Rayni Romito Williams of Williams & Williams played their parts beautifully in the lead-up to this insane house finally ending up in their "Sold" column. To kick things off, they plunked down $50,000 a month for advertisements on billboards along Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, plus other ads in various print publications catering to high-end clientele.
But in the game of $70 million home sales, you have to give potential buyers much more individualized attention than billboards and magazine ads can offer. In Persson's case, that included a specially-hired chef to prepare a $5,000 meal with a main course of lamb chops. After Persson made it to the house, he hilariously decided he was more in the mood for sushi rather than lamb chops, and the meal was scrapped. What do you do when you have a potential customer who wants sushi at short notice? Most of us would probably just throw our hands up in the air and say "better luck next time," but these two realtors somehow got famous sushi chef Nobu Matsuhisa on the hotline and had a sushi spread delivered to the house for Persson to enjoy. Presentation is obviously important, so Persson's sushi was delivered to him by a waitstaff of professional models. There's no word on whether a royal fool was also enlisted to entertain Persson as he ate, but it's doubtful if anyone would be surprised if there were.
All this catering to Persson's tastes – in a very literal sense – seems to have done the trick, since he bought the house back in December of 2014 (and paid for it with $70 million in cash, a mere fraction of his $1.3 billion net worth). And the people at Williams & Williams are back to their old tricks again, spending $40,000 in production costs on what they've described as a "lifestyle film," but which is actually a lavish advertisement for their newest Los Angeles real estate listing – a mansion in the Bird Streets neighborhood of LA and priced at $33 million.
