Inside Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent’s Bicoastal Real Estate Portfolio

Celebrity Real EstateInside Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent’s Bicoastal Real Estate PortfolioThe celebrity designers share TV hosting duties, two children, and a great taste in luxury homes

By Joyce Chen

May 20, 2022

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Since  Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent began dating in 2012, the now-married pair have bounced from New York City to Los Angeles and back again.Photo: Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Images for Living Spaces

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When Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent first met on a fateful furniture-shopping date in 2012, they knew that they were meant to be. The pair wed just two years later, and have followed those same gut instincts in their professional and personal lives ever since. The dynamic duo have hosted numerous home design shows together—Nate & Jeremiah by Design; Nate and Jeremiah: Save My House; and most recently, The Nate & Jeremiah Home Project—and have bought and sold many homes in those years. 

“Jeremiah always says, ‘It’s either the place or the space that holds you,’” Berkus previously told Architectural Digest. “For him it’s the place. For me it’s the space.” The couple has pinballed between both coasts in order to get that just right feeling, and presently, call the East Coast home. But, both Berkus and Brent are quick to note, that doesn’t mean that New York is forever. “One thing I can promise you,” Berkus told AD in that same 2020 interview, speaking about the pair’s former Los Angeles residence, “is that I will never again tell a publication that a house is my forever home.” Brent added, “We shan’t be saying that again!”

2013

Berkus and Brent made their first real estate purchase together a year before their lavish wedding at the New York Public Library. The couple picked up an impressive 2,800-square-foot penthouse on the 14th and 15th floors of a prewar co-op building just above Washington Square Park. They reportedly paid $6 million for the penthouse and an adjacent one-bedroom, which they combined into a three-bedroom duplex with a terrace. “We couldn’t stop thinking about the apartment, believing we were meant to live there,” Brent told AD. “And then, suddenly, we were able to create the home of our dreams.” 

The residence featured French limestone floors in the entrance hall, herringbone wood flooring, high ceilings with original crown molding, marble mantle fireplaces, and French doors leading out onto a terrace. Perhaps one of the most impressive rooms was the kitchen, with its solarium-style windows, butcher-block countertops, and marble shelving. They listed the duplex for $10.5 million in 2015 and ended up selling it for $9.8 million the following year, but that wasn’t the last the pair would see of their beloved home. The couple revealed in the November 2021 finale of The Nate & Jeremiah Home Project that they bought the duplex back. “I never thought that we would move home, and that’s what Fifth Avenue has been for us, it was always home,” Brent said on the emotional episode.

Also in 2013, the couple paid an undisclosed amount for a one-bedroom unit located in a nearby 19th-century prewar brownstone in NYC’s Greenwich Village. It’s unclear whether they spent much time at the charming apartment, since they purchased the much more spacious penthouse around the same time. They listed this unit in 2019 for $800,000 after outfitting the space with a “mix of vintage finds and pieces from their current collections,” according to a release. (There was an option to purchase the apartment fully furnished for an added cost.) Images from the listing reveal a sun-lit home with a black-and-white design motif, a high-ceilinged living room with a marble fireplace, a cozy kitchen with white subway tile backsplash, and French doors leading from the main living area into the bedroom, which boasts floor-to-ceiling built-in closets. The unit has since sold.

2016

A few years later, the design power couple set their sights on the West Coast in both professional and personal capacities. They snapped up a $2.36-million, 3,643-square-foot Spanish-style bungalow in West Hollywood around the corner from the Chateau Marmont and flipped it. Photos of the home after Berkus and Brent’s renovations reveal a sunken living room with high ceilings and unique rounded corners, a wall of built-in shelving in the kitchen, a studio space above the garage, and ample outdoor lounging spaces. They ultimately sold the house for $2.855 million in 2019.

Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent’s former Los Angeles home.

Photo: Douglas Friedman 

At the same time, the couple and their then toddler daughter Poppy relocated to a sprawling estate in Hancock Park, still in L.A., which they purchased from Friends creator Marta Kauffman for $8.185 million. The 9,000-square-foot Spanish Colonial–style home was originally built in 1928 and included a 200-year-old oak tree in the backyard, which very much sparked their interest. “We pictured Poppy, and eventually the rest of our family, playing under that tree, and we thought this was a place we could put down roots,” Brent told AD at the time. The home featured a wrought-iron stairway in the front foyer, a mahogany-paneled dining room, and a pool surrounded by a Granada tile deck out back. By late 2018, however, the couple realized how much they missed New York City, and so they put the six-bedroom and six-bathroom home on the market for $13.795 million. They sold it for $11.35 million the following year.

2019

The kitchen at Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent’s former New York City town house.

Photo: Nicole Franzen

Upon returning to the East Coast, the couple found an 1899 town house in the West Village and immediately fell back into the groove of NYC living. They paid $9.75 million for the pad and likely spent a whole lot more completely gut renovating the 3,400-square-foot home, upgrading everything from wiring to plumbing to the bathroom tiling. They made room for a larger closet in the primary suite, and installed a massive double-height bookcase in the living room made of white oak, which became the centerpiece for the home. “It’s my favorite of everything we did here,” Berkus told AD of the bookcase. “It set the tone.” The couple lived there with their young daughter Poppy and baby son Oskar for two years before hefting the home back onto the market in 2021. They sold it for $13.5 million in an off-market deal that August.

Though the couple enjoyed having NYC at their fingertips, they also craved a little bit more space. In late 2019, they bought a quirky and modern Montauk, New York, home from photographer Raphael Mazzucco. The three-bedroom, three-bathroom beach house was last listed at $1.59 million, though it’s unclear how much Brent and Berkus ultimately paid for it. The property is an eclectic getaway spanning 3,500 square feet, with a large chef’s kitchen that opens onto a seating area with a stone-walled dining nook, a living room with high ceilings and chandeliers, and a primary suite with a bathroom sink made from Arizona turquoise. Much of the home was built with reclaimed wood, including the bedposts in the guest rooms. There’s a teak soaking tub, a sauna with infrared technology, a heated pool, and a chicken coop out back. During the pandemic, the couple also added a tiny house in the backyard. 

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