Upper Bundoran: Manor house under foreclosure
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The seven-bedroom, five-fireplace house with 55 acres is underwater.PUBLICITY PHOTO
Another grand Albemarle house is headed toward the auction block. Upper Bundoran, the house built by the son of the man who built Scott Stadium, is under foreclosure and will be sold on the courthouse steps April 18.
The 6,500-square-foot Georgian manor on 55 acres is part of the Bundoran Farm "preservation development," but its developer insists the rest of project is not in trouble.
"That's completely separate financing and a separate lot," says Robert H. Baldwin Jr., general manager of Edge Valley Preservation LLC, the company developing Bundoran Farm. "Foreclosures are never good. We take them very seriously."
Royal Bank of Canada is calling its $3.1 million credit line on Upper Bundoran, which has been listed for sale for $2.6 million. "It's underwater," acknowledges Baldwin.
The plan for the 2,300-acre Bundoran Farm is to keep most of its acreage under conservation easement as pasture, forest, and orchards, and to plant 108 residential lots in the middle of that. "Tax credits are not part of our plan," say Baldwin of the popular land preservation perk used by some developers, such as Biscuit Run's, to mitigate investment losses.
Bundoran Farm sales have picked up, with 17 lots recently sold. "We suffered like everybody else," says Baldwin. "For a year and a half, we didn't make a single sale. We're very encouraged."
He's not concerned that Wells Fargo, which financed the rest of the project, will pull the plug in the wake of the Royal Bank of Canada foreclosure. "Wells Fargo has been fully aware of everything we do and that Upper Bundoran was on the market," says Baldwin. "This is not coming as a surprise to them."
That was not the case for Patricia Kluge and Bill Moses. When Farm Credit called its $34.8 million loan on Kluge Estate Winery and Vineyard, creditors Sonabank and Bank of America followed suit, auctioning off Kluge's Vineyard Estates subdivision and Albemarle House, respectively.
Fred Scott's parents bought Bundoran Farm in 1940, and built Upper Bundoran. He remembers moving into it in 1952 when he was 12 years old. "Mom stayed there until a couple of years ago," says Scott, who lives in the 1830-built Lower Bundoran.
"The project out here has done pretty well–- they've sold lots of lots," says Scott, who sold the farm in 2006 for $31 million. Qroe Preservation, along with partners Celebration Associates, Crosland, and the Spring Company, is developing the farm as Edge Valley Preservation LLC.
The project hit a tragic setback in 2006, when an airplane carrying Qroe founder Robert H. Baldwin and associate David Brown crashed in the fog on the farm, unable to find the landing strip.
That was followed by a real estate collapse. "It's been a long haul since 2006," says Bob Baldwin, son of the Qroe founder. "But we think the project is solid."
14 comments
Chn29 is reporting- " Property Values On the Rise". Something doesn't make sense here. There is a glut of high end properties either not selling at all, going into foreclosure, or selling for reduced prices. Can someone explain the disconnect between this and what is reported by the officials quoted at 29
http://www.nbc29.com/story/14318532/property-values-on-the-rise
yeah.. if a family of four weighs 500 lbs in 2006 and a has two more kids and granma moves in their total family weight will go up. (even if some members of the family diet)
I think new construction accounts for a lot of it.
New construction may well be a factor. But speaking as one who pays taxes on a City house that hasn't been new for more than 150 years, I can attest that City Assessor Roosevelt W. Barbour Jr. and his helpers have been disconnected from reality for quite some time. Since 2007, they have continued to raise my property valuation despite the general downturn and the fact that properties very near mine have sold at notable losses.
As one example, a hundred-year old house that was bought as a fixer-upper in 2005 for $298,950 and renovated completely sold last year for only $187,500. As another example, a house that was built new in 2006 and sold to a broker (a "We Buy Houses" sort of broker) in 2008 for $215,291 resold last year for only $180,000. And other houses are being rented out because their would-be sellers can find no buyers even at much lowered prices.
Over assessment is rife in town. And appeals are routinely (and rudely) rejected. Meanwhile, City Assessor Barbour wisely pays his property taxes to Albemarle County.
There are in Alb. & C-ville as of today (and a few maybe overlaps from MSS site)
144 properties 1million+ for Sale
285 properties 500-1 million
303 properties $300-$500,000
360 properties $200-300,000
298 properties $ 0 -$200,000
A "mere" millionaire couldn't afford 1 million+ house so how many multi-millionaires are there looking at the 144 properties over a million at one time?
The 17 lot sales quoted at Bundoran are not that rosy since 12 were sold to Bramley Investments LLC and 2 to Fred Scott himself.
Does anyone know if Bramley Investments LLC has any connection to Edge Valley Preservation LLC, the company developing Bundoran Farm .
Fredericksville Va. City assessments went down 13.4% City wide (in 2010) so in 2009 the City increased their tax rate from 56 to 70.5 per 100. Charlottesville in both 2010 and the new assessment of 2011 has city wide basically no change. Statistics apparently are not being kept of what a property sells for and what the assessed value was in Charlottesville. Since I work at Court Square it might be interesting lunch time work to find all the residential homes (excluding commercial) recorded in Jan & Feb of 2010 and compare the assessed value in 2011 and see what the results are. One would probably have to do sales of 2010 not 2011 as 2011 sales "will be reflected in next years assessments" would probably be the stock answer. I would have to think if I would want to take on such a project.
Sam:
It would be unfair for anyone to ask you to undertake such a comparison, but if you chose to do that work you would be performing a true public service. Most of us have only anecdotal evidence of assessment irregularities and irrationalities. Solid data would be welcome
Re the properties I mentioned above:
The house built new in 2006; sold to a broker in September 2008 for $215,291, and resold to a couple in February 2009 for $180,000 is assessed for 2011 at $317,400.
The hundred-year old fixer-upper sold to a rehabber in June 2005 for $298,950 and resold after complete renovation to a couple in July 2010 for $187,500 is assessed for 2011 at $205,400.
Meanwhile, my .6,000 square foot vacant lot with no sidewalk on a narrow one-way side street is assessed for 2011 at $60,300 while an 8,200 square foot City-owned vacant lot with a sidewalk on a two-way main thoroughfare was assessed for 2011 at $50,000 before being sold three weeks ago to Southern Development for $40,000.
If anyone can discern any civic equity or real world economics in any of those numbers, do please point them out.
I live very close to this development and certainly care about what happens with the land/R.E. values in this immediate area.
My opinion is that those 17 lot sales in the past twelve months are pretty impressive...no matter how you look at it! 12 sales to one LLC is not uncommon, especially if that LLC is made up of family members who want to live close to each other in a beautiful setting like North Garden (Bundoran Farm)...as is the case here. I have met the family.
The most impressive point of fact that I have read here is that Mr. Scott, after selling his family farm for a generous amount of money back in 2006 has decided to reinvest in two building lots. Way to go Fred!
If you talk to the sales team out at BF they will tell you (check your county records in the coming weeks) that there are actually two additional lot closings to occur in the next 30 days out there…and you don't have to take a walk or ride your bike by their Baldwin Center for Preservation Development more than once in a while to notice that these guys are BUSY showing real estate.
I for one am happy for them and trust that one foreclosure within an otherwise successful community won't slow them down.
I've started researching at lunch. I am working on all recorded deeds of sales in the City in Jan 2010. I'm writing the address,Grantee-Grantor (in order to tell if its family to family etc.) Assessed Value (most are written on the first page of the deed now) and the sale price. The majority so far are selling for less than the assessed price. Suppose several months or the whole year of 2010 should be done for a pattern. Then at some time it would be interesting to see what the 2011 valuation became of the same properties.
Sam:
Good for you. Just one thought, though. Your tracking of recently sold properties won't say anything about assessment increases on property that hasn't been sold for years and is not for sale now.
For instance: Assessments on properties we bought in 1987 and 1988 have been raised twice since the bottom dropped out of the market. We protested the first increase and were told that it was justified by our vacant lot's "market appeal." I don't doubt the same thing would have happened had we protested this year's increase on our homeplace. Unfortunately, we were too busy fighting other City Hall depredation to find out.
Here is the Jan 2010 "Towler" report for Deeds recorded in the City in Jan 2010. (One month takes at least 3 lunch periods and then more time to figure up so taking breaks it would take about a week to do one month, 12 weeks to do one year, etc.
There was one big commercial recording in Jan 2010 (111-115 West Main St.) it was assessed at 2,238,800 and sold for 2,200,000 or 1.76% less than assessed value.
There were 15 sales to base a residential percent on. Total Assessed value at 3,714,000 and total sale price of 3,416,500 or 8.69% lower than assessed value.
Not counted in the 15 were two sales where the assessed value was not on the deed, 5 trust sales (X going into the X trust or vice versa in which the sale price is ususally not mentioned), one builder sale where it was a vacant lot the year before, one habitat for Humanity sale (this person apparently has already sold the house, I will check if it was at a profit, in order to answer are people flipping Habitat homes for profit as soon as they get them?)
The largest sale above assessed value was a house on St. Ann's Road (sold 70K above assessed). One of the largest sales below assessed value was a Condo on Yellowstone Drive assessed at 166K+ and only sold for 96K. Gaffney Homes sold a house in Huntley assessed at 463,600 for 393,000. One (town?)house in Orangedale was assessed at 157K and sold for only 82,500. In Brookwood, Southern Dev. sold a house assessed at 282K+ for 257K+.
A neighbor purchased their (city) home in May 2010 for $180K; the city assessed it in September 2010 for $237K. Something similar happened when I purchased my (city) home in 2004, my next assessment was at least $40K more than I paid. Comforting to know that we've all gotten such bargains...
I corrected a mistake and looked up the ones the attorneys didn't put an assessed value on.
In Jan 2010 there are 18 recordings one could base a figure on for City residential sales. 1 sold for the exact assessed price, 5 sold for more, and 12 sold for less than assessed. Total dollar sales were 3,864,500 for the 18 sales. Total assessed value by the City was 4,328,700 being a difference of 464,200. 464,200 X 100 divided by 3,864,500 is 12 percent. 464,200 x 100 divided by 4,328,700 is 10.7%. (The Habitat house has not been resold or flipped)