LOUD & PROUD

Housewives star Anita Lloyd shows us Real her lavish home and sets the record straight about her wealth

- MARELIZE GRBICH

IF THE saying “what you see is what you get” could get a face to it, Anita Lloyd would be a good candidate. She calls things as she sees them, believes in being 100% authentic 100% of the time and doesn’t suffer fools gladly.

Anita’s particular brand of honesty made her one of the most-talked-about cast members of Die Real Housewives van die Wynlande (The Real Housewives of the Winelands) – with praise and criticism coming from viewers in equal measure.

We’re catching up with Anita a few weeks after the reunion show aired. Her life is starting to return to normal and she’s welcoming us into her palatial home in the picturesque winemaking town of Paarl’s Pearl Valley estate.

The show had a lasting impact on her life, Anita (56) tells us. “It’s touched my life in many good ways. But there were some tough moments.”

One of those moments came after her comments about worshipping Mammon, the god of money.

Other cast members – Karen Schwendtke, Amy Kleinhans-Curd, Candice Bester, Mariska Thorpe and Michelle van Zyl – had shared details about their wealth, including their extensive wardrobes, Arabian horse breeding and love of shopping, and her comment tied in with that, she says.

The backlash that followed hit Anita and her husband, Boyce Lloyd (56), hard. Boyce, the former chief executive officer of wine and spirits producer KWV, isn’t here today – he’s at the company he managed for many years to hand over the reins to the new CEO.

The media reports were tough to deal with because they implied her behaviour on the show cost Boyce his job, Anita says.