Playing surfaces, which were being torn out a few years ago, are once again a desirable amenity among would-be estate owners.
Los Angeles real estate agents say that homes with tennis courts are now highly sought after again in 2021, a big change from earlier years when many homeowners were replacing courts with pools, gardens or other amenities.
Credit goes to a surge of interest in the socially distanced game in the COVID era — coupled with Los Angeles home buyers looking to have more space, another result of the pandemic. “People were taking them out,” says Linda May of Hilton & Hyland. “Now there’s a complete revival. People are playing with their kids, and they are having tournaments on weekends.”
Continues May, “What we found in COVID, with everybody staying home is that everybody wants additional space. People want an estate, and an estate is a house with a tennis court.”
A few dozen Los Angeles properties that are currently on the market feature a tennis court. Most listings start at $10 million. May currently is representing an English-style, 16,439-square-foot property on 3 acres at 1201 Tower Grove Drive in Beverly Hills. Listed for $49.95 million, it includes a tennis court with an adjacent pavilion that leads to a screening room and two home offices.
Other houses for sale around Los Angeles that include tennis courts are a 1936 house by architect Paul Williams in Holmby Hills that’s listed with The Beverly Hills Estates for $48 million; the Azria Estate, co-listed for $85 million with Tomer Fridman of The Fridman Group and Mick Partridge of The Partridge Estates; and a six-bedroom house at 13058 Rivers Road in Mandeville Canyon listed for $64.5 million with Hilton & Hyland.
May’s highest-end clients do have one caveat about courts: “They don’t want to see it from the [house’s] public rooms, from the dining room or kitchen window. They want to gently walk to it, and for it to be a destination.” If space allows.
Scroll on for a selection of pictures of L.A. homes with tennis courts.
1201 Tower Grove Drive
Azria Estate
13058 Rivers Road
A version of this story first appeared in the Dec. 15 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.