Jeremy Renner is quite the handyman, said Chris Jones in Esquire. When the Avengers star signed his first big movie contract, in 2002, he used the money to buy a rundown Los Angeles house with fellow actor Kristoffer Winters. “I hated paying rent,” the actor says. “It was just money going out the window.” They remodeled the house for fun, but when it sold for a $240,000 profit, they realized they could turn their hobby into a business. The pair started buying promising properties, and often lived in the gutted houses, without plumbing or power, to save a few dollars. “I can tell you every Starbucks that had a bathroom around [Los Angeles],” Renner says. His latest project is an 11-bedroom mansion that he bought at an IRS auction and plans to sell for at least $25 million. Renner thinks that his sideline in construction has taught him the skills he needs to sustain a long career in Hollywood. “Building a house is like producing a movie. There’s no right way to do it, but a lot of wrong ways. You have to be flexible and creative. You have to move fast, be prepared—or it quickly becomes costly. It’s certainly affected how I approach my life.”
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