Turns out, Bill Gates is not the new owner of a $60 million castle in Northern Italy.
Last week, Italian newspaper Il Secolo XIX reported that the Microsoft co-founder supposedly purchased the famous Villa San Giorgio in Italy’s Liguria region. According to the local rag, Gates was said to have bought the historic property through his Four Seasons real estate company and planned to turn the building into a luxury resort. However, his team has since denied these reports.
“Bill Gates did not purchase Villa San Giorgio, the sea-view building in Portofino nicknamed the ‘Castle,'” a spokesperson for Cascade Asset Management Company, Gates’s wealth manager, told ANSA.
The fortress-like structure in question was used for military defense during the Roman Times because of its elevated position; however, it was later abandoned, The Daily Mail reported. After a British diplomat scooped the place up some decades later, it was converted into the luxury villa seen today. Also known as Portofino Castle, the ancient European spread measures 12,917 square feet, and it even sports an elevator that will bring you directly down to the beach.
Portofino, which is perched on Italy’s northwest coast, has long been a popular hideaway for jet setters, entrepreneurs, and celebs. Fashion designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana famously have villas there, while Leonardo DiCaprio, Jeff Bezos, and Jennifer Lopez have all visited the colorful fishing village, not to mention it’s where Kourtney Kardashian and Travis Barker got married at Villa Olivetta.
While the spokesperson says that the “information is not true,” if the sale had happened, it wouldn’t be the first time that Gates added an Italian property to his impressive $170 million real estate portfolio. In 2021, Gates’s private equity firm bought a majority stake in the Four Seasons Hotel chain from Saudi Prince al-Waleed bin Talal in a $2.2 billion deal. Four Seasons was subsequently awarded a contract for a new resort in Rome, located within a 17th-century palazzo right by St. Peter’s Basilica and the Spanish Steps, which will become the city’s first six-star hotel.
UPDATE (10-6-23): Cascade has denied Gates purchased the property and the article has been amended to reflect this.
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