Gene Simmons of Kiss lists Henderson mansion for $14.95M

Just five months after buying it, Gene Simmons of Kiss is trying to sell his Henderson mansion.

The 72-year-old rock star, long known for donning a body-armor-style outfit and black and white face paint on stage, listed his Southern Nevada estate for $14.95 million, according to an announcement Thursday from his listing brokers at Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Nevada Properties.

Simmons’ home, 7 Talus Court, is in the mountain-mansion Ascaya community. It spans roughly 11,000 square feet and sits on almost an acre of land, including a nearly half-acre plot filled with more than 130 trees, a “little forest” that cost $1 million, he said.

The mansion has six bedrooms, eight bathrooms and, according to listing broker Evangelina Duke-Petroni, an underground garage that can hold up to seven cars, in addition to the main four-car garage.

Its courtyard entrance has a “floating walkway” over a koi pond, and the house comes with an elevator, an 11-seat theater, floor-to-ceiling windows, disappearing glass walls and sweeping views of the valley, a news release said.

Duke-Petroni said the two-story house also features a subterranean level that was carved into the mountain.

Clark County records indicate the Kiss bassist bought the house and the lot next door — which Duke-Petroni said is now filled with elm, ash, myrtle and tipu trees — in May for $10.8 million combined.

Simmons told the Review-Journal on Thursday that he had never owned real estate in the Las Vegas area before he bought the mansion in Ascaya, nor had he ever tried to sell a home this quickly after buying it.

He said he has “quite a few houses all over the place” and that he wanted to move his family to Henderson, but they balked at the idea because of Southern Nevada’s intense heat.

Simmons said he stayed in the home for a few months, but he started going on tour, and given that his family didn’t want to be there, the place was empty.

Questioned about what initially got him interested in buying the house, he said, “Taxes.”

Asked if he would be interested in buying another one here, Simmons replied, “Can you speak with God and change the weather?”

Blasted out of the McCullough Range by Hong Kong tycoon Henry Cheng, Ascaya boasts more than 300 homesites and street names such as Cloudloft and Epic View.

The luxury community also sat idle for years after the mid-2000s bubble burst, with its empty, cake-layered mountainside lots a visible symbol of Southern Nevada’s real estate crash.

Simmons’ house, completed in 2016, was the first built in Ascaya, Duke-Petroni confirmed.

Sales accelerated in Ascaya amid the broader, cheap-money-fueled housing frenzy of the past year or so. One buyer, Raiders owner Mark Davis, purchased a 6-acre plot in Ascaya last year and is building an ultra-luxury house that would look strikingly similar to the Raiders’ practice facility in Henderson and even, in some ways, Allegiant Stadium.

Project plans filed with the city of Henderson show a three-story, seemingly Raiders-colored mansion with floor-to-ceiling windows, a “man cave,” a steam room, a sleek pool area and an area for “guest/vendor parking.”

It would also rise to a peak in the middle where the top floor resembles the bridge of a ship.

Contact Eli Segall at esegall@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0342. Follow @eli_segall on Twitter.