Miami Beach mansion sells for $16 million

Miami Beach mansion sells for $16 million

A German businessman has paid $16 million for a Miami Beach mansion completed just weeks into the global financial crisis.

The 17,200-square-foot residence at 88 La Gorce Circle comes with two docks, a staff house, a five-car garage. marble staircase and an elevator. Seller Todd Glaser, a developer, built the 10-bedroom mansion “on spec,” hoping he could find a deep-pocketed buyer once the project finished. Construction began in January 2008, and finished in November 2008, just as a credit crisis was throwing financial markets into turmoil.

Nearly 18 months later, the house sold furnished for well less than the listing price of $25 million (reduced in 2009 to $19.5 million). But it’s still believed to be the priciest residential deal in Miami-Dade since Shaquille O’Neal’s Star Island mansion sold for $16 million last year.

Glaser’s partner in the venture was Armin Mattli, owner of Clinique La Prairie spa and a real estate investor, according to the sellers’ law firm, Waserstein Nunez & Foodman.

Adverse possession: Latest housing fraud to strike South Florida, police say

Adverse possession: Latest housing fraud to strike South Florida, police say

Imagine going to a house or condo you own and finding a stranger living there who claims the property no longer belongs to you.

It’s happening across Florida and other parts of the country through what authorities say is abuse of a centuries-old concept known as adverse possession.

Dating back to Renaissance England, adverse possession allowed people to take over abandoned cottages and farmland, provided they were willing to live there and pay the taxes. These days, officials say, the legal doctrine is being misused by squatters, trespassers and swindlers to claim ownership of vacant or foreclosed homes.

In Broward and Palm Beach counties alone, adverse possession claims have been filed on some 200 homes in recent months. Three of the four people behind the claims have been arrested, and police are investigating the fourth man, who along with his father, a convicted mobster, tried to take over properties in Hollywood.

Michael Tilson Thomas’s Miami Pad [South Florida]

Michael Tilson Thomas’s Miami Pad [South Florida]

When he was an eight-year-old kid in Los Angeles, Michael Tilson Thomas and his best friend were sometimes watched by his friend’s much older brother-in-law, Frank Gehry. Mr. Gehry would ask Mr. Tilson Thomas about the music he was practicing on the piano. It was the beginning of a long-lasting association between Mr. Tilson Thomas, who grew up to become the well-known music director of the San Francisco Symphony, and Mr. Gehry, now one of the country’s best-known architects.

“We’ve had many conversations over many years about music and art and space,” explained Mr. Tilson Thomas, now 65. And over time, those conversations have led Mr. Tilson Thomas, whose wood-paneled Edwardian in San Francisco is filled with arts and crafts furniture, to include a more modern aesthetic in his 1925 pink stucco Mediterranean home here on prestigious North Bay Road.

Despite its opulent surroundings, the Miami house is modestly decorated with tropical patterned wicker furniture and round white paper lanterns designed by sculptor Isamu Noguchi. Sitting in the living room are three pieces designed by Mr. Gehry: his “Wiggle” and “Side” chairs made from layers of cardboard and his “Cloud” lamp, so-called because of its shade’s cloud-like appearance.

Cash buyers push out would-be homeowners [Northern California]

Cash buyers push out would-be homeowners [Northern California]

When Marianna and Shannon Chaffin saw the three-bedroom, two-bathroom house on two acres in the Madera County countryside, they fell in love and made their best offer — only to see someone else snap it up for $9,000 less.

Why? The buyer paid cash.

It’s a harsh reality for homebuyers in the Valley’s depressed real estate market: The houses are out there, but sellers want an uncomplicated deal, even if that means accepting a lower offer. And cash talks.

While cash purchases are driving up sales, they’re also making it more difficult for traditional buyers to compete.

Unsealed drywall documents show how information was stifled [Central Florida]

Unsealed drywall documents show how information was stifled Unsealed drywall documents show how information was stifled [Central Florida]

Once it had replaced the tainted Chinese drywall causing a furor among builders and suppliers in South Florida during 2006, Knauf Plasterboard Tianjin Co. Ltd. offered the problematic material back to its main supplier with the caveat that it not be sold in the United States.

Donald “Mickey” Coblentz, an executive with Miami-based Banner Supply, said in a sworn deposition unsealed by a judge on Friday that Knauf officials tried to resell the suspect board after taking it back from Banner in 2007, but nobody wanted it.

Knauf subsequently offered the board back to Banner for free, Coblentz said.

“They offered me the drywall for free and I said no. Then they came back and said if we give you the board we want you to sell it overseas,” Coblentz said. “I go, you take care of your board. I don’t want it.”

Property insurance: How prepared is Florida’s property insurance market for the hurricane season?

Property insurance: How prepared is Florida’s property insurance market for the hurricane season?

Hurricane season officially will begin Tuesday, and Florida’s state-run property insurance programs are better prepared this year than in the past. Private insurers are largely stable, but there are questions about whether several can handle the impact if major hurricanes strike the state.

The state’s insurance programs, Citizens Property Insurance and the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund, will be able to borrow the money needed to pay claims if the state experiences an active hurricane season.

But the financial problems some private insurers say they are facing have led legislators and regulators to support an insurer-backed bill, SB 2044, that would strengthen insurers by allowing them to increase rates and reduce some claims-related costs.

Gov. Charlie Crist has until Tuesday to sign or veto the bill, passed by the Legislature.