I did read the update about this being false. That said I've heard other, similar, rumors out there which I'll get into in a second.
For starters the "Silent Hill" IP is worth quite a bit, it's something that goes beyond just the video games, which have been successful enough on their own to generate a large cult following, and while I could be wrong even with some of the lamer efforts they have all apparently made money which is why it's been kept going. Silent Hill spawned multiple limited run comic series (doing well enough where more were made), and also TWO movies both of which were successful. The first Silent Hill movie cost 40 million to make and grossed over 100 million, the second movie only made 20 million but still managed to gross over 50 million despite being panned (I just double checked the movies on Wikipedia). The biggest problem with Konami is it hasn't leveraged the IP very well, or taken care of it, it has a huge amount of potential that with better management and a good creative team could make a lot of money, even Silent Hill's big "failures" have turned a profit, I mean that universally panned movie made over twice as much as it cost.
I've been hearing multiple groups have been bidding on the IP, although nothing as reliable as was put out there, this mostly from chatter in various games and talking to fanboys and the like. Supposedly both Universal and Warner Brothers have had their eye on the IP for various projects ranging from wanting to do more movies to TV shows, not to mention that both allegedly want the IP for their theme parks (Universal has Universal Studios in Hollywood and Orlando and Warner Brothers has connections to Six Flags). Apparently back in 2012 when the second movie came out Universal used Silent Hill along with Resident Evil for it's "Halloween Horror Nights" and Silent Hill in particular went over pretty well supposedly they wanted to use Silent Hill again this year for their 25th Anniversary but have had trouble negotiating the rights. What's more given their work with the props and the movies it's been theorized that they might want to open a full time horror-themed area to replace "Marvel" in "Islands Of Adventure" given that the license will inevitably expire and Disney will of course want Marvel for their own parks. Turning the Marvel section and perhaps the "funnies" section into a permanent version of Halloween Horror Nights themed after Silent Hill is something that has allegedly been under discussion. According to this rumor Warner Brothers wants it too, but has more of an eye towards TV shows, but also figures it could also be used by Six Flags.
As far as my source goes, I was talking about going to HHN last year and mentioning I was vaguely considering going this year again if I can afford it, and I ran into someone in an MMO (yeah I know) claiming he works for a company that designs Roller Coasters and Universal supposedly wants to scrap "The Incredible Hulk" when they renovate and replace it with a hanging monorail coaster inside of tubes where images can be projected, and one of the big themes they are interested in is "Silent Hill", and he claims he's also received queries about such a potential design from Six Flags who seem to be under the impression Warner Brothers might wind up having the rights.
At the end of the day it's likely BS, but the point is that it seems probable that the rights are out there in the wind, and there are probably a number of people interested even if Microsoft wasn't one of them. The price tag of billions (multiple) seems unlikely but I could potentially see the IP going for as much as a billion dollars given that it made close to a hundred million dollars in profit off of the two movies alone, not to mention the video games, comics, and anything else I'm not thinking of. What's more given the success of things like "Under The Dome", "Lost", and other things, I could easily see someone producing a decent TV series about a group of people stuck in the town where surreal things happen, and of course they can justify throwing in some action. I also suspect fans would give it another shot for a movie, especially under a new creative team, and as much as people complain about some of the games the simple hype the new game was getting shows the audience is there if someone wants to put in the effort.... in short it's a proven IP.