Buckhead Estate neighbors intend to be party poopers

I guess it takes just one too many topless pool parties to ruin things for everyone.

The wild bash — advertised as the “Biggest topless pool party ever!” — was held May 23 at the Buckhead Estate, a mansion near Lenox Mall touted as “Buckhead’s Premier event space.”

“Estate” is a misnomer. The term evokes images of a stately brick manor and rolling greenery. This, however, is an 11,000-square-foot, 11-bathroom behemoth with an indoor pool and hot tub surrounded by concentric levels of rooms and squeezed onto a lot on a busy road.

It’s a house with a history: It was built by a developer/diplomat with bribery in his past, occupied by a rapper who’s had financial issues, and then owned most recently by a family in the strip club biz looking for a side hustle. In a way, the property is a quintessential Atlanta saga.

And now the house at 3511 Roxboro Road threatens to slam the burgeoning shortterm-rental market because it has generated more calls to police than Animal House gave Dean Wormer headaches. There have been more than 90 such calls to the cops so far this year, about three dozen of them noise complaints.

One neighbor within range of the 3 a.m. window-rattling music is Atlanta Councilman Howard Shook. He and his neighbors in the well-to-do community are beyond fed up, and Shook said he will introduce legislation to unplug the party.

His proposed ordinance, he said, “is going to deem shortterm-rentals an illegal use in single-family residential areas.”

Shook considered a proposal last year to limit and license short-term rentals as the Super Bowl approached but held off because he didn’t want to impact homeowners who were making cash by renting out their mini-estates.

Governments across the country have regulated, licensed and taxed short-term rentals in response to neighbors’ complaints and their own worries that the new business platform steals tax revenue. Airbnb, the industry leader, has tried to fend off