Directing a move and a movie

Joanna Kerns, who played journalist-mother Maggie Seaver on the ABC sitcom “Growing Pains� (1985-1992) and will direct and co-star in the “Growing Pains� TV movie to air in May, has sold her Brentwood home for $3.4 million.

Kerns and her husband, architect Marc Appleton, plan to build a new home in the area. Appleton renovated the Brentwood house in 1993, after he and Kerns were married. Kerns had purchased the home in late 1988.

The estate is Spanish in style and has three bedrooms and 3 1/2 bathrooms. The 3,600-square-foot main house has an open kitchen/family room and a master bedroom suite with a fireplace.

There is a one-bedroom, 900-square-foot guesthouse with a living room and a kitchenette. The grounds have a pool and a courtyard with a dining area. There are hewn-oak hardwood floors and custom doorways throughout the home.

Kerns, 51, will direct the original cast from the sitcom in the second “Growing Pains� TV movie. The first “Growing Pains� movie was a hit for ABC in 2000. Kerns starred in TV movies in the ‘90s, and she directed segments of a number of TV series, but she directed her first telefilm, for Lifetime, last year.

Susan Gitlin and Jody Fine of Prudential/John Aaroe & Associates, Brentwood, had the listing on the home. Gitlin also represented Kerns when the actress-director bought the house.

A new space for TV carpenter

Ty Pennington, host of the new ABC show “Extreme Makeover, Home Edition,� has purchased a Venice home for $1.1 million.

The former set designer was one of two carpenters in residence on TLC’s program “Trading Spaces� before he started hosting the new home-improvement show.

His new home was freshly renovated and expanded -- but not by Pennington’s new show, which renovates homes of families needing help. Pennington bought the house from builders Michael Tarne and Roberta Durra.

Pennington purchased a two-story contemporary with three bedrooms and 2 3/4 bathrooms in 2,100 square feet. The home was built in 1924. It also has a fireplace in the living room, bamboo floors, vintage windows, a laundry room with a sink, and a master suite with tree-top views.

There are stainless-steel appliances and sculpted concrete counters in the kitchen. There is a front porch and fully landscaped front and rear yards. The second floor was an addition.

Pennington, 38, started hosting “Extreme Makeover, Home Edition� in February. In one week, the show remakes an entire house, taking it down to the studs, moving walls, redoing plumbing, rewiring, redesigning interiors and installing new landscaping.

Denise Freed and Diane Louise Duffy, both of Coldwell Banker in Santa Monica, had the listing and represented Pennington in his purchase.

Home fit for the King is sold

A Palm Springs home owned in the ‘70s by Elvis and Priscilla Presley has been sold for $1.25 million.

The house, with five bedrooms and 4 1/2 bathrooms in slightly more than 5,000 square feet, is in the Old Tuscany area of Palm Springs, in the foothills of the San Jacinto Mountains.

Considered a historic site by the city, the house, built in 1946, is protected against demolition; any changes to the exterior are subject to planning department review. The Presleys bought the house in 1970 for $85,000. They were divorced in 1973. The rock star owned it until he died in 1977.

Preserving the exterior may mean maintaining a spa that the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll had built into an outside corner of his property. The spa is covered by a gazebo, which shielded Elvis from helicopters.

The home, which sits on nearly two residential-zoned hilltop acres with valley views, also has a sauna and a steam room. It was a party house for Elvis.

Louise Hampton of Prudential California, Palm Springs, had the listing. She is a member of the Desert Estates Network.

No joke: Laikin buys in the hills

Dan Laikin, chief operating officer and director of National Lampoon, has purchased the longtime Hollywood Hills home of the Peer music family for under the asking price of $5.9 million.

San Francisco-based Ralph Peer II, chairman and chief executive of peermusic, was the last member of his family to own the home, which was on the market for the first time in 60 years. The Peers, overseers and owners of a global network of music publishing companies known for a catalog rich in country and Latin music, had owned the home since the 1940s.

Known as Park Hill, it sits above the Chateau Marmont on Sunset Boulevard. The mansion, built in 1925, has five bedrooms in 8,800 square feet, according to public records. The home, behind gates, is on almost three acres with expansive lawns and towering trees.

There is a four-room master suite, study/library, pub, media room and pool. A separate guesthouse has served as a recording studio in recent years.

Steve Sawai of Coldwell Banker, Brentwood East, represented both sides of the transaction.

Erteguns to sell renovated house

Ahmet Ertegun, founding chairman of Atlantic Records, and his wife, interior designer Mica Ertegun, have put a Beverly Hills home they bought and she renovated on the market at just under $3.4 million.

The couple saw the house last year and bought it for about $1.9 million in a partnership, to refinish and sell. The house hadn’t been updated and had been in the same family for 40 years.

Now that they have listed the house, the Erteguns are shopping for a larger one in the L.A. area for themselves. They have lived primarily in New York and own homes in Turkey, Paris, New York City and the Hamptons.

The Beverly Hills house was built in the ‘20s, and it has four bedrooms and 5 1/2 bathrooms in 5,000 square feet. Mica Ertegun added bathrooms to convert the bedrooms into suites. She had the kitchen rebuilt, including an expanded breakfast area; a new media room, terraces and garden areas were also created. The house has city and ocean views and a pool.

Mica Ertegun’s design firm, MAC II, has designed homes and commercial interiors for such luminaries as Henry Kissinger, Keith Richards, Diane Sawyer and Mike Nichols, and the Safra banking family.

Ahmet Ertegun had a hand in the success of Led Zeppelin, among other pop groups. Ertegun is founder of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.

Ernie Carswell and his Carswell Collection at Coldwell Banker, Beverly Hills North, have the listing.