Neighbors of the Chan-Zuckerbergs in Palo Alto's Crescent Park neighborhood say that the city and local police have basically bent over backwards to accommodate their local celebrity billionaire, at everyone else's expense.

We're pretty well familiar with the real estate doings of the billionaire class around here. And Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been quite the gobbler of real estate both in the Bay Area and beyond in the decade plus since he joined that billionaire class, got married, and started having kids.

Zuckerberg and his wife have long called Palo Alto home — choosing its more dense, suburban environs over places like Los Altos, Hillborough, Woodside, or Atherton where they could have had a bit more space. And it was a full nine years ago that SFist was reporting on the couple's plan to demolish four homes they purchased around their main home in order to create more privacy. At the time, the City of Palo Alto rejected those plans, saying that a billionaire couldn't just redraw lot lines and construct a compound however he liked.

But now, nine years on, neighbors tell the New York Times that the Chan-Zuckerbergs went ahead creating a five-property compound anyway, turning one of those buildings, illegally, into a private school, and building some 7,000 square feet of possibly connected basements that they call a "bunker" and Zuck's "bat cave."

And that's not all. Zuckerberg has reportedly assembled a total of 11 properties both on the same block and across the street, buying up six of them in just the last three years at enormous expense — sometimes double or triple what they're worth. And one next-door neighbor who's been a holdout in this spree, Michael Kieschnick, tells the Times that his property is now bound on three sides by Zuck-owned properties, and he complains, "No neighborhood wants to be occupied. But that’s exactly what they’ve done. They’ve occupied our neighborhood."

"Billionaires everywhere are used to just making their own rules," Kieschnick adds. "But it’s a mystery why the city has been so feckless."

Zuck has apparently made offers on Kieschnick's home, but he's turned them down, so far.

Entire, habitable homes are apparently just being used as staging areas for outdoor parties. And it sees like the couple is on a mission to buy up the entire block whenever they get the chance.

The Times has aerial imagery showing the various houses in the compound that were demolished to make way for smaller buildings, a pool, and the massive underground portion.

Neighbors say the disruptions have been constant, whether it be construction noise over the last eight years, construction equipment and trucks blocking their way home, or noise from large parties that the couple has thrown. Some tell the Times that their street is "used as the compound’s shipping and receiving dock, and parking lot," and setups and teardowns for parties can take days.

As for the illegal private school, which apparently has 14 students — including, presumably, the Chan-Zuckerbergs' three daughters — and at least six staffers including four teachers, the city has apparently done nothing to penalize them for running it on a block where no such use is permitted.

The city claims, on the record, that no preferential treatment has been granted to the billionaire couple, but pretty clearly it has — they had originally pledged not to tear down any homes, but they went ahead and did that anyway. And local police even provide special security reserved for dignitaries when they throw events.

Neighbors of the Chan-Zuckerbergs' former home on Liberty Hill, near SF's Dolores Park, are clearly glad that the couple gave up on their enormous pied-a-terre there, selling it in 2022 after 10 years and many years of construction disruptions as the couple built some sort of city compound. But they've gone on to build other compounds in Hawaii and on Lake Tahoe, and as Zuckerberg must see himself kissing Trump's ring for the next few years, he's made sure to purchase a $23 million mansion in DC this year as well.

And does Zuckerberg ever leave the compound to make nice with the nighborhood, like at their annual block party? No. But he apparently sent them an ice cream cart for the last event, and neighbors tell the Times they've received other gifts over the years as apologies for noise, including chocolates, sparkling wine, and noise-canceling headphones.

Photo via Google Earth