When Ellen DeGeneres and her wife Portia de Rossi snapped up Kitesbridge Farm, a 43–acre farmstead in the heart of the Cotswolds, the case appeared to have been made that they were in it for the long run.
After all, they had paid £15million for the home, near Witney in Oxfordshire – £2.5million more than the asking price – and seemed set on settling down in England in order to live life beyond the reaches of Donald Trump‘s America.
The farm has a lot to offer: a sweeping kitchen, bespoke solid wood furniture, dressing rooms, marble–clad en suites, a two–bed guest cottage, indoor swimming pool, helipad and a five–car garage inside a converted granary barn.
‘We’re just not used to seeing this kind of beauty,’ she told broadcaster Richard Bacon during an event in Cheltenham in July.
‘The villages and the towns and the architecture – everything you see is charming, and it’s just a simpler way of life. I just love it here.’
But a year after snapping it up, Kitesbridge was already back on the market – with the asking price hiked from £15m to a cool £22.5m. The bulk of the uplift is said to cover what she spent on renovations.
Ellen and Portia relocated to a new–build that her estate agent admitted looked as if it belonged in Malibu. So much for the villages and the towns and the architecture, it seems.
‘We decided we needed a different house, and now we are selling that house. So if anyone wants a house, it’s a beautiful stone farmhouse,’ she told an audience at an event in July.
Ellen DeGeneres’ Cotswolds farmhouse hit the market in July for a cool £22.5million
She moved to the UK with wife Portia De Rossi (pictured) in November 2024, the day before Donald Trump was elected for a second time
The pair have now moved to a new–build property elsewhere in the area, which is rapidly becoming a hot favourite with the American elite
What could Kitesbridge have possibly lacked? If you ask the former talk–show host, she had thought of everything but the stables.
‘When we decided to live here full time, we knew that Portia couldn’t live without her horses,’ she said in a statement released via estate agents Sotheby’s.
‘We needed a home that had a horse facility and pastures for them.’
Whether that is the only factor at play is another question. Ellen has denied reports last year that Kitesbridge was flooded in November at the peak of Storm Bert – just after they moved in.
The couple arrived in Britain the day before Trump was elected for his second term, which she said was received poorly by her friends – all of whom texted her with ‘crying emojis’, she later disclosed.
And at the end of the month, Bert wrought 69mph gusts on England and the country recorded one of the wettest days on record since Storm Alex in October 2020.
Amidst the chaos, a Thames tributary beside Kitesbridge burst its banks during Storm Bert, leaving the couple ‘virtually marooned’.
Images showed water swamping out the land next to the house – but she has denied that levels rose enough to breach the boundaries of her house.
Writing in an Instagram post, she said: ‘For those of you concerned, our UK farmhouse did NOT flood.’
She later shared a video of a swan in what she called a ‘river meadow’ beside the house, writing: ‘We got visited by a holiday swan–a–swimming. Please note, the swan was swimming in our river meadow. Not our house. #NotFlooded.’
Andrew Barnes, listing agent at Sotheby’s, said there were never any flooding issues at the property, which sits on high ground.
The photographs of Kitesbridge certainly bear no signs of water damage: instead, it’s an unlikely pristine slice of California in the heart of the Cotswolds.
Design experts have suggested that Ellen’s house is a ‘beige void of vibes’ due to its uneasy mix of contemporary Californian aesthetic and old English tradition
Almost every room in the house – and elsewhere, including the pool – mixes stark whitewashed walls with wooden fixtures such as exposed beams
Solid wood furniture and exposed beams sit against stark white walls and muted tones: there are no bright splashes of colour here.
Natural wooden tones, white and muted grey are the order of the day here: design as seen through the colour–blind eyes of a dog.
Its blend of archetypal English cosiness and stark white–washed Californian aesthetic is likely not for everyone – and could explain why it’s yet to be snapped up despite legions of wealthy Americans eyeing up a move to the Cotswolds including, it is thought, Beyoncé and Jay–Z.
Ellen and Portia might face an unexpected hurdle they have not encountered before: discerning wealthy Brits who don’t want California in their corner of the Cotswolds.
After all, the house went on the market in July for £22.5million – £7.5million more than she paid for it in June 2024. Ellen claims to have spent $9million (£6.6million) on the house, setting her up for a rough profit of £900,000 if it sells.
British buyers may not be taken by, as Sotheby’s puts it, the way it has been ‘beautifully reimagined over the past year to an exceptional standard’.
The Beverly Hills–lite ambiance of stark white walls against exposed wooden beams will not be for everyone.
J.Nichole Smith, design and colour psychology expert and founder of creative agency Joy First, believes the ‘beige void of vibes’ is likely to be putting people off.
She told the Daily Mail: ‘While I do think it’s likely the price tag is the issue – with a smaller group of buyers, obviously – one thing I can say is that this makeover feels very psychologically inconsistent.
‘When building a premium brand, for example, it’s essential the first impression sparks tremendous desire, led by emotions of course, and this place is basically just a beige void of vibes.
‘It’s not just the clash of California and British, but it’s got competing personality types: is it minimal or is it cozy? Is it warm or cool? Each room seems to have no clear intentional mood other than neutral nothingness.’
She reckons any potential buyer will be less likely than other ‘Ellen house’ buyers to keep her furnishings, as the chat show host says people have in the past.
‘New owners are likely to put their own stamp on it – and a lot of the inconsistencies are soft furnishings,’ she continued.
The look continues into the gym. Ellen says she typically sells homes fully furnished and ready to live in
Design and colour psychology expert J.Nichole Smith told the Mail that the design of the interior was ‘psychologically inconsistent’
Ellen has suggested that she and Portia put the house on sale after less than a year because it lacked stables for her wife’s horses
‘It’s certainly not brimming with the cohesive desire–building character that would make it leap off the website and make someone feel: ‘Oh my gosh, that place is one in a million, I have to have it’.
‘The design psychology is off and as a result it’s giving “meh” instead of “wow”.’
And Liv Conlon, of The Property Stagers – which prepares homes to look their best for hitting the market – believes that while the house feels ‘luxurious without being ostentatious’, the American influence may be seen as overbearing by some.
‘Ellen has meticulously thought about her buyer – creating a layout where entertaining spaces and private suites feel equally considered,’ she said.
‘That said, it looks as though you can take the girl out of California but… there’s no question the LA influence dominates in the style, sometimes to the detriment of what buyers might expect from an Oxfordshire farmhouse.
‘Polished concrete walls around the pool, glass walkways and the party barn feel very LA – they’re glossy and glamorous, but they risk overwhelming the heritage bones of the estate.
‘When you replace authentic with sharp, contemporary finishes, you risk erasing the warmth and soul that Cotswolds buyers cherish. International buyers might love it, but traditional British buyers may find it cold.
‘In terms of the asking price, on one hand, we can see the work done on the farmhouse is exemplary but potential buyers will be asking themselves whether this aesthetic will translate into long–term value in the UK countryside market.’
There might be another truth at the heart of why the house is on the market: it might have been the plan all along.
Ellen is, by her own admission, a rampant house–flipper, turning over dozens of properties for profit over the last two decades.
She even wrote a book, entitled Home, about her love of interior design, in which she noted: ‘I tend to keep painting the painting until it’s so done, there’s nothing left to do… That’s when I sell the canvas and buy a new one.’
And she has more time than ever for the hobby after the curtain fell on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in 2022 following claims from multiple employees that she had helped to foster a ‘toxic workplace’.
Ellen and her wife have taken to British life – dining out at Jeremy Clarkson’s pub, The Farmer’s Dog, which is close to the farmhouse
The curtain fell on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in 2022 after accusations were levelled at her of fostering a ‘toxic workplace’
She would later note in 2024 that she ‘got kicked out of show business for being mean’.
When she and Portia arrived at Kitesbridge, the centuries–old farmhouse was ‘quite tired, with a quite basic finish,’ Sotheby’s agent Mr Barnes had said. It was inevitable that they would do it up – and then look to move it on.
Some reports suggest Ellen and Portia only lived at Kitesbridge for a month. Then they brought in seventy workers, who spent four and a half months fixing it up, before listing it for sale.
In other words, this may just be another house flip – one of many. Analysis by the Wall Street Journal suggests she and her wife have owned at least 34 homes over the last 20 years.
She bought a midcentury house in Los Angeles just off Mulholland Drive for $1.275 in 2004, and flipped it two years later for $2.3million, reportedly to the late actor Heath Ledger.
Property records suggest they bought and sold five houses in 2020, and eight in 2021 and 2022, and have profited to the tune of $190million (£140m).
On average, their return is about 37 per cent. Of course, that doesn’t factor in the substantial refurbishment costs.
As their business manager Harley Neuman told the WSJ: ‘I would love her to have made that big of a killing.’ Mr Neuman suggested the real number of homes sold may be as many as 50.
Ellen styles each home herself – down to the furniture, which comes included in the price of each home – so she can rightly consider each house sold as validation of her interior design nous.
In fact, owning an ‘Ellen House’ carries a certain amount of cachet: alongside Ledger, Ariana Grande and Will Ferrell are among those said to have bought one.
Whether that charm has made the journey across the Atlantic remains to be seen.
Ms Conlon of The Property Stagers added: ‘What she’s really selling is a turnkey product with celebrity connections – it’s an “Ellen house.”
‘And while, of course, that may attract a global buyer who wants a ready–made trophy home in the Cotswolds, for those who are looking for authenticity and architectural integrity in a farmhouse, the Californian gloss may actually deter rather than attract.’
And as Ellen waits for the right buyer to come along, the question of whether anyone has expressed interest in the house remains, for now, under wraps. The Daily Mail has contacted Sotheby’s for further comment.
