Re: Housing Search Is Expensive for Getty/Public Good?

[Guest guest]

>

> Housing Search Is Expensive for Getty

>

> A $3.5-million home the trust bought for use of an official had

mold

> that left it uninhabitable.

Sharon:

I'm waiting for Alan Funt or a predecessor to come from behind the

cameras. How can a house for $3.5 mil be good for the public?

Trust, at least to me, is only relative, to the amount per gallon

we're paying for gas and oil.

I hope the amount of remediation process is moderate, fair and just

on all levels!

Peace,

Tom Bowles

>

> http://ktla.trb.com/news/la-me-house15feb15,0,5972583.story?

> coll=ktla-news-1

>

> By Ralph Frammolino and Felch, Times Staff Writers

>

> February 15, 2006

> ktla 5 - Los Angeles,CA

>

> Already under investigation for questionable executive spending,

the

> J. Getty Trust recently purchased a $3.5-million official

> residence for its new museum director's use only to find that the

> house was contaminated with mold and uninhabitable.

>

> Getty officials bought the house in Beverly Glen near UCLA in

> October after Director Brand decided not to live in a home

> the trust already owned next to the Getty Villa near Malibu.

>

> But shortly before he and his family were to move into the Beverly

> Glen residence, inspectors opened the walls and found so much mold

> that the house was considered unsafe to live in.

>

> The Getty then made an offer on a $5.5-million house near Santa

> . Spokesman Ron Hartwig said the trust pulled out of the

deal

> Tuesday after inspectors found structural problems with the roof.

>

> Meanwhile, the Getty is paying $15,000 a month to rent Brand a

> Holmby Hills home with five bathrooms and a swimming pool on a two-

> acre lot.

>

> Nothing prohibits the Getty from buying an official residence for

> its museum director to use. In fact, many leading museums do so.

>

> But under the tax code, nonprofit organizations must use their

> resources for the public good and provide " reasonable " compensation

> for employees. In Brand's case, the use of the house would be

> considered additional compensation beyond his annual base salary

of

> more than $480,000.

>

> The state attorney general is investigating spending by former

Getty

> Chief Executive Barry Munitz †" and at least one land transaction

he

> was involved with †" to determine whether any of it jeopardizes

the

> trust's nonprofit status. Munitz resigned last week under pressure

> from the board.

>

> At least one authority on nonprofit governance, U.S. Sen.

> Grassley (R-Iowa), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said

> Monday that the Getty's spending on a home for its museum director

> seemed excessive.

>

> " Apparently Getty officials didn't get the word that 'Lifestyles

of

> the Rich and Famous' went off the air in 1995, " said Grassley,

whose

> committee oversees the IRS, which regulates tax-exempt

> organizations.

>

> " Champagne wishes and caviar dreams still seem to rule the day

> there, " he said. " It's hard to see how a nonprofit museum can

> justify spending millions of dollars for its director's house. "

>

> While acknowledging that they face a " short-term " loss over the

mold-

> contaminated house, Getty officials say they are determined to get

a

> refund and have consulted attorneys about a possible lawsuit.

>

> " We're desperately trying to get our money back, " said Getty board

> Chairman Biggs. " That house is not going to work out, and I

> think we're going to essentially come out even. "

>

> Getty officials said they didn't order a mold report before

closing

> escrow on the house, relying instead on a 2004 report that the

> previous owner supplied showing there was no fungus in the walls.

> The former owner's real estate agent, who spoke on condition that

he

> not be identified, said that along with the report, his client

> provided a standard written notice urging the Getty to conduct its

> own mold investigation.

>

> Los Angeles attorney B. Castro, who has represented wealthy

> home-buyers as well as won multimillion-dollar court awards over

> construction defects, said the Getty has only itself to blame.

>

> " If someone had come to me and said, 'Gee, Mr. Castro, we had a

mold

> inspection a year and a half ago,' my answer would have been: Are

> you out of your mind? Do you know how fast mold grows? " he said.

>

> The costly saga over finding a museum director's residence started

> with the talks to lure Brand from the Virginia Museum of Fine

Arts.

> With the blessings of the Getty board, Munitz offered to buy a

home

> for the 47-year-old administrator's use.

>

> Hartwig said the board set a spending limit of $5 million to $6

> million but asked Getty staff to try to keep the purchase to $4

> million. He said the intent was to buy a Westside home close to

the

> Brentwood museum and big enough to host community meetings,

> fundraising events and other museum functions.

>

> Providing such homes is not unusual for major museums. Until last

> year, the Metropolitan Museum of Art provided a Manhattan

residence

> for Director Philippe de Montebello. The Los Angeles County Museum

> of Art's new director, Govan, will live in a home owned by

a

> museum-related foundation.

>

> In Virginia, Brand, his wife and their two children lived in a two-

> story house owned by a foundation associated with the museum he

led.

> The director said that after accepting the Getty job in August, he

> took a house-hunting trip during which he looked at 30 homes, with

> specific requirements in mind.

>

> " This is not a house being bought for me, " he said in an interview

> last week. " This is a house being bought for the museum. "

>

> Among the properties he toured was one the Getty already owned: a

> two-story, four-bedroom stucco home on Surfview Drive, next to the

> Getty Villa, with a swimming pool and a view of the Pacific.

>

> Records show that the trust bought the house five years ago for

$2.6

> million to settle a neighbor's lawsuit over the Villa renovation.

> The purchase price was about $1.1 million more than what

comparable

> nearby homes sold for in 2001, records show.

>

> Brand said he decided not to live in that home because it was

> isolated and didn't have the floor plan or backyard space needed

for

> entertaining. Getty officials said that they realized the home was

> too small to host museum-related functions and that they did not

> consider it an ideal fit for their new director.

>

> With the $4-million limit in mind, officials eventually made an

> offer on the 70-year-old, 4,900-square-foot Spanish-style home at

> 711 S. Beverly Glen Drive. It was owned by a trust on behalf of an

> unnamed female celebrity.

>

> A source close to the transaction said the Getty jumped at the

four-

> bedroom house with open-beam ceilings and custom stained-glass

> windows after the seller dropped the price from $4.4 million to

$3.5

> million in September.

>

> During the routine inspections, nothing indicated a problem with

> mold, Getty spokesman Hartwig said.

>

> He added that the trust would have looked closer if there had been

> indications of mold.

>

> " The people responsible for getting the house ready were very

> comfortable using the year-old report, since there was no

indication

> of mold in the general inspection, " Hartwig said.

>

> Several Westside real estate agents and mold experts said it was a

> mistake for the Getty to rely on the report, especially after last

> year's record rains.

>

> With enough space and nutrients, mold can spread throughout a

house

> in three to six months, a prospect that motivates many high-end

home

> buyers and agents to routinely lay out the $300 to $500 for a

basic

> mold inspection.

>

> Their hope: to avoid the kind of nightmare that befell Ed McMahon,

> the former ny Carson sidekick who won a $7.2-million insurance

> settlement after claiming that mold in his Beverly Hills house

> killed his dog Muffin and sickened him and his wife.

>

> The 90210 ZIP Code " has been a hotbed for mold issues, primarily

> because the people who can afford " mold testing have it done, said

> Dennis Butcher, vice president and general manager of

Environmental

> Management Solutions, a mold remediation company in Chino.

>

> That the Getty didn't do its own mold test " makes no sense to me, "

> said Fitzgerald, a leading Coldwell Banker agent in

Beverly

> Hills who added that she would have one done even if the owner

> didn't " just for peace of mind. "

>

> " We do a mold inspection with every single sale we do, " said

> Fitzgerald, who called such precautions " de rigueur … even in

condos

> built in 2001. "

>

> Hartwig said the Getty discovered its mold problem around

Christmas

> during renovation to ready the house for the Brands. While

preparing

> the living room for painting, crews found moisture on a wall. An

> expert was called in, the wall was opened and mold was discovered.

>

> That's when the Getty ordered air testing, which revealed mold

> spores throughout the house. " Destructive " tests, which punched

> holes throughout the walls, showed that fungus was " rampant, "

> Hartwig said.

>

> The smell was so bad that one Getty employee who walked through

the

> house after the testing felt sick, went home and woke up the next

> morning with her eyes sealed shut because of irritation.

>

> " The people we relied on believe that mold as extensive as [was]

> ultimately found in the house would not have grown in a year's

> time, " Hartwig said. " We're at a loss to explain how that could be

> the case if mold was not present and not made known to us. "

>

> He said that even if the Getty doesn't get a refund, it considers

> the Beverly Glen property a " liquid asset " on which a new home can

> be built and sold for a profit.

>

> After the trust determined that the house was unsuitable, it

> scrambled to find a rental for Brand and started looking for a

> replacement home.

>

> Hartwig said the Getty made its offer on the $5.5-million house

near

> Santa on Feb. 1 and last week opened escrow, only to find

the

> defects that led to the trust's decision Tuesday to withdraw its

> offer.

>

> Frances Hill, a professor at the University of Miami School of

Law,

> said the IRS' standard in determining the appropriateness of homes

> provided for nonprofit executives is " reasonableness. "

>

> " Shock and awe is the right response, even in Los Angeles, " she

said

> when told the Getty was considering the purchase of a $5.5-million

> home for Brand. But she acknowledged that real estate is expensive

> in Southern California and added: " There is no number that someone

> says, 'That's too much.' "

>

[Guest guest]

Tom,

I know this sounds weird, but in parts of LA, a $3.5M house is not necessarily stupendous. I am process of negotiating a purchase for a client in San Obispo. The house is 625 sf, on a 6000 sf lot. It has no view and it is 75 years old. The asking price is $695K. But it is really cute. lol

Sharon