Casey Abby Blog's: Alicia Keys Leaves Desert, Sells Arizona Vacation Home for $3.1M

Thursday 1 July 2021

Alicia Keys Leaves Desert, Sells Arizona Vacation Home for $3.1M

Alicia Keys Sells Arizona Home — Michael Tran/Getty Images

The desert retreat where singer-songwriter Alicia Keys often tickled the ivories just sold for $3.1 million.

Keys and her music producer husband, Swizz Beatz, bought the private mountain home on North Camelback Canyon Drive in Phoenix back in 2008. The original owners built it in 2001.

“In Arizona, we don’t have an ocean. This house is located on Camelback Mountain, which is iconic for our state, and Camelback Mountain is kind of known as our Arizona oceanfront,” says Scott Grigg, the listing agent for the house. “What makes this home unique is it sat on the top of Camelback Mountain, so there was no one above. From a privacy standpoint, it was very private.”

The couple had previously tried to sell the home in 2016 for $3.85 million.

Exterior of Alicia Keys’ former home in Phoenix
Matt Moreno

Grigg says luxury buyers covet the Camelback location because of its views.

“We enjoy hillside properties. They’re fun and unique, because they’re great to show in the evening time, which you usually don’t do on flatland properties,” Grigg explains. “They’re fun to bring people out at night, so they can see the city-light views.”

The house sits behind a gate and has four bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms on a total of 7,050 square feet of living space.

Since the lot the home sits on isn’t flat, the house itself isn’t typical desert architecture.

“We’re spoiled here in Arizona. We’re so used to everything on one level and spread out. This is a hillside home, so it involves steps and multistories,” Grigg says, adding that the multiple levels in hillside homes are attractive to out-of-state buyers, who are used to stacked spaces.

This home didn’t serve as a full-time residence for Keys, Beatz, and their family.

“It was set up for friends and family to all come and enjoy at the same time, and make memories during the holidays,” Grigg says, adding that Keys and Beatz chose to sell the home because they just weren’t using it much and wanted to take advantage of the hot market.

Designed for entertaining a crowd, the home offers plenty of open space, a theater, game room, a wet bar, exercise room, and an 800-bottle wine cellar.

A wide-open kitchen features high-end appliances, as well as spectacular views both for the cook and for anyone else hanging out in the kitchen.

Outside, you’ll find a large deck with a negative-edge pool and spa that look as though they are hanging over the hillside.

As far as land goes, the home sits on nearly an acre of rugged desert hillside.

“Normally, [hillside home buyers are] not buyers with children, because you don’t have a large yard for kids,” he says. “If you have an acre of flat land, the kids can run around. On hillside homes, you don’t get a lot of run-around space, but your view is your yard.”

Those gorgeous views continue in the bedroom, especially in the main bedroom, which features huge windows and is large enough for both a grand piano and a custom-made circular bed.

“The way it was designed with the windows is that you can sleep in there with your blinds open and know that someone’s not going to be looking into your windows,” Grigg explains. “It kind of gives you that feeling like you’re in a penthouse in the sky—but you’re in a single-family home.”

Grigg has worked with many high-profile clients and says there’s one thing that sets them apart from other buyers and sellers.

“When you’re dealing with celebrities or high-profile clients, you have to be patient on their response time. It’s not like a typical transaction, where you might get a response back within a period of 24 hours, like you would from a from a regular seller—because they’re busy,” he explains. “You need to make sure that you prep whoever is on the buyer’s side. You kind of have to make sure you catch a high-profile client when they’re available, and that might be at 11 o’clock at night. You have to be available when they are.”

Stephen Sweeney assisted Grigg with the sale from Los Angeles.