The $11 Million Love Nest YaVaughnie Gave Up after Her Break Up with Charles
Vengenance-by-billboard artist YaVaughnie Wilkins hasn't said anything about her best-jilted-lover-revenge-plot-ever, but we've discovered one good reason she might be pissed at Charles Phillips: She had to give up this $11 million estate along with her tech titan boyfriend.
UPDATE: The billboards in New York and Atlanta have been taken down. That ought to kill this story!
After Phillips, who is currently living with his wife on the Upper West Side of New York, confirmed he had recently broken off an 8 1/2-year long relationship with Wilkins last night, the story of Wilkins' campaign, first reported by Gawker, to publicize the affair via a web site with hundreds of photos and billboards in New York, San Francisco and Atlanta has been picked up everywhere, including the New York Post's front page this morning. Wilkins is evidently pleased with her handiwork; after our posts went up, Wilkins emailed the designer of the web site saying, "I've become famous."
She may be famous now, but her whereabouts are still unknown. According to public databases, Wilkins' most recent address was at this massive French chateau in the town of Hillsborough, Calif, just a 20-minute drive from the headquarters of Oracle Corp., where her former boyfriend Charles Phillips is paid nearly $20 million a year. The eight-bedroom home sits on a two-acre lot with a pool and a tennis court. Sure enough, this 2009 photo of Wilkins on a scooter, taken from the massive stash of incriminating photos she posted on her site, appears to have been taken just outside the driveway of the San Mateo home—at right is the Google Street view of the outside of the home.
The house was purchased in February 2008 by an entity called NewLife88 LLC — what a hopeful name for a shell company! Here's what we know about NewLife88: In the 2008-09 fiscal year, it was Hillsborough's 10th-largest taxpayer [pdf], owing to the home's $20,600 property tax assessment. It was organized in Nevada in January 2008, just a month before the the Hillsborough home was purchased, and according to real property and corporate database searches, appears to have transacted no other business aside from the purchase. NewLife88's manager, according to Nevada records, is another Nevada company called Redkey12 LLC, which was organized in February 2008 as a foreign limited liability company and also appears to have no other purpose aside from its relationship with NewLife88. Redkey 12's manager is Jeffrey R. Matsen, a San Matero, Calif., lawyer who specializes in asset protection for wealthy clients.
Wilkins was living well in Hlilsborough, to judge by photos of the spread on this real estate site:
And here, for comparison, are some more 2009 photos of Wilkins galavanting around her home, which appear to match up precisely to the Hillsborough love nest:
But nothing lasts forever: Alas, NewLife88 sold the home just last month, on December 16, to a private equity investor and his wife. Which means Wilkins had to clear out at just about the same time that her web site and billboards disclosing her eight-year affair with a married corporate titan who was just last month publicly singing the praises of his wife in a speech were starting to appear. If only new lives could stay new forever.