It's a bit of a cliché to buy a tropical island when you're a super-rich celebrity. It's on the 'to-do' tick list for many A-Listers, who like to have complete privacy when they go on vacation. Kim Basinger didn't want an island though. Perhaps she thought that the time spent flying to and from such a place was too much to deal with? In any event, she took the unconventional route of buying a town in Georgia instead.
It cost Basinger $20m to secure the purchase, which she decided upon on a whim when she found herself stuck in a traffic jam there once. She loved the scenery, and thought it would make for a great filming location, so she hatched a plan to turn it into a tourist attraction and open some purpose-built film studios. Sadly for Basinger, it didn't quite go to plan. She ran out of money before she could achieve her vision, and ended up selling it only five years later at a $19m dollar loss. Ouch.