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Scattered across 540 acres of San Diego County hills and ravines, the 235 opulent homes of the Bridges at Rancho Santa Fe flank a private golf course and country club with tile-roofed towers inspired by Tuscan villages.

The placid panorama belies decades of bruising battles among the project’s developers. The cast includes home-building titan Lennar Corp., a bankrupt La Jolla deal maker and, in an improbable late entry, con man-turned-preacher Barry Minkow.

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The dispute ultimately led to a federal criminal conviction against Minkow and a continuing investigation by the Justice Department. But it all began here, at a classic Southern California home development that promised riches for its partners but ended up exacting a high price on the key players.

The court filings offer a rare glimpse into the inner workings of a high-end real estate deal gone bad.

Lennar, the venture’s main financier and manager, says it lost $50 million on the Bridges in spite of the custom-built mansions and expensive tract homes gracing its hillsides. Sales soared during the housing boom, but by 2009 the company was moving only one home every two months, San Diego real estate consultant Russell Valone said.

“Lennar did not go into this project thinking they were going to sell half a unit a month,” said Valone, the president of MarketPointe Realty Advisors. “There’s no way they planned on being there that long — they’re a public company and they want to get that money back and put it to work.”

At the center of the wrangling is Lennar’s partner at the Bridges: Nicolas Marsch III, 64, of La Jolla. A native of Chicago, where his family was in the construction business, Marsch took the helm of the enterprise in the 1970s and set out to make his fortune as a developer in California and Colorado.

Marsch ultimately set his sights on Rancho Santa Fe, 25 miles north of downtown San Diego. Described by CBS sportscaster and former resident Dick Enberg as “Beverly Hills in the country,” the very private suburb caught the world’s attention in 1997 when 39 cultists at a rented mansion poisoned themselves in expectation of ascending to a spaceship.

Marsch had purchased much of the Rancho Santa Fe land by the early 1980s. He launched the project he then called Horizon Country Club in 1985, in a partnership with a wealthy Northern California developer, Ronald Williams.

The partners had a falling out in 1988, court records show, with Marsch accusing Williams of withholding funds for Horizon to pressure Marsch into selling out cheap.

By 1990, work had shut down. The site sat fenced off for most of the decade as the pair battled in court — and were sued in turn by business partners who said they had been stiffed, including the noted golf course designer Robert Trent Jones Jr.

When the court dust settled, Williams ended up with the property, which he seized as collateral for defaulted loans, and Marsch ended up with a $37-million judgment against Williams. To buy out his partner and revive the project, Marsch needed more financial muscle — and found it in Lennar.

Miami-based Lennar began looking for joint ventures in California in 1995. By the end of that year it was talking to Marsch, who brought a local developer’s edge: a ground-level view of the project and familiarity with the power brokers who ultimately authorize developments.

Marsch’s dealings with San Diego’s power elite went back decades: He had sold a Breckenridge, Colo., ski condo in 1979 to a group including Roger Hedgecock, a county supervisor and later San Diego mayor who wound up convicted for his role in a campaign-finance scandal.

The group paid less than market value for the condo and soon sold it at a big profit, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported in 1984. Hedgecock and other supervisors voted to reduce development in parts of the county’s Alpine area, but not where Marsch owned property.

No formal allegations of wrongdoing emerged in the case. Hedgecock, now the host of a nationally broadcast radio talk show, declined to comment on the condo deal or Marsch.

The development deal struck by Marsch and Lennar, like many other projects expected to take years before becoming profitable, included front-end fees to compensate the organizers in the earlier years.

Beginning in 1999, Marsch enjoyed a hefty income stream from the Bridges, including $310,000 a year in developer fees, plus 3.5% of every lot sale, home sale and club membership, and a smaller fraction of home resales, a San Diego Superior Court judge wrote in summarizing the case. Lennar also agreed to cover a host of Marsch’s expenses, including his legal tab for suing Williams, debts to previous investors and the taxes owed on earnings from the Bridges.

Lennar and Marsch agreed to split any eventual profits 50-50 — but only after the home builder had recovered the hundreds of millions of dollars in capital it had poured into the deal, plus 25% interest a year.

By Eliot Brown

Investor Andrew Farkas is in a deal to buy NAI Global, a Princeton N.J.-based commercial real estate services firm, the companies announced today, in a move to bolster his firm C-III Capital Partners, which acts as a “special servicer” for troubled commercial mortgages.

The move comes as the owners of special servicers, middlemen that work out troubled mortgages on behalf of investors in commercial mortgage-backed securities, are trying to develop larger commercial real estate services firms.

These firms, which had relatively muted presence during the market’s peak, effectively became celebrities overnight in 2009, when loans began defaulting en masse. Suddenly, they became the arbiters for tens of billions in troubled commercial real estate debt, holding great sway over how defaulted mortgages get worked out. In addition to Mr. Farkas, investors from Fortress Investment Group to Vornado Realty Trust to Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway stepped up to buy the servicers and transform them into larger firms.

CWCapital, owned by Fortress, bought DTZ Rockwood, a real estate investment banking firm, in the spring, for instance.

Mr. Farkas, who bought loan servicer Centerline Holding Co. last year and renamed it C-III, has begun originating loans, as well as buying numerous distressed properties through a closely watched tool called the fair value purchase option. The approach, in which C-III buys the assets it manages, has attracted attention given potential conflicts of interest involved.

As for the NAI Global deal, the firm is a network of independent commercial real estate firms — many brokerages — that use the NAI brand. The firm itself has about 50 people on staff, and a membership of about 190 companies, said Jeffrey Finn, the chief executive.

In a statement, Mr. Farkas likened the acquisition to the strategy he used to build up Insignia, which brought him great success in the 1990s, as he bought up firms to gradually become a behemoth commercial real estate services firm.

The price was not disclosed.

WEEHAWKEN, N.J., June 20, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Minmetals Inc. announced the promotion of David Grimaldi as Head of the Real Estate Investment Group in the United States. In this newly created role, Mr. Grimaldi will manage the firm’s existing portfolio while overseeing the strategic expansion initiatives of the company’s real estate investments across the United States.

Mr. Grimaldi joined Minmetals in late 2009 to act as Asset Manager of the firm’s hotel holdings. Prior to joining Minmetals, Mr. Grimaldi was with Morgan Stanley for five years where he served as Financial Advisor. During his time at Morgan Stanley, Grimaldi was consistently ranked number one in his peer group, nationwide, in all three metrics used to evaluate performance. Mr. Grimaldi received his Bachelor’s Degree in Finance from California State University in Fullerton.

Minmetals Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary and US headquarter office of China Minmetals, one of the world’s leading mining and commodity trading firms.  China Minmetals is a state owned enterprise under the laws of the People’s Republic of China and is recognized as a global fortune 500 organization. For more information, visit www.minmetals.com.

Contact:
Xixiang He
201-809-1898

SOURCE Minmetals Inc.

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The situation: You want to make some improvements to your house, but don’t want to spend money you don’t have. Nor do you want to waste the money you do have by buying something inappropriate for your needs.

A tall order, for sure, and a situation many homeowners find themselves in as the economy totters toward a recovery that always seems just shy of a sure thing.

The Internet has made finding the best price for a product easier than it was 10 years ago, said developer Carl Dranoff, who has written the checks for more than a few renovations at his buildings over the years.

“The Internet has driven down the prices of just about everything,” he said, “so there is little variation” from, for example, one manufacturer’s refrigerator to the next.

Need replacement windows? A modest federal tax credit – up to $1,500 – is available until Dec. 31.

Energy-efficient windows will cut utility bills 7 percent to 15 percent, government data show. But the cost of complete window replacement for the average home is $7,500 to $10,000, according to the folks at the Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star program.

They advise this: When you’re interviewing contractors, ask them to break down the price quote by labor and materials, keeping in mind that although energy-efficient windows cost more, the labor costs for installation should be the same for all kinds of windows.

In general, experienced buyers recommend that you shop carefully, and know exactly what you want before you hand over your credit card or write a check to a supplier.

“A dozen years ago, you might have to go to specialty stores to find the really groovy items,” said Center City real estate agent Mark Wade, who also buys and renovates condos for resale. “Today, it is as simple as hitting Lowe’s, Target, or Home Depot.”

Stores don’t stock everything they offer, though. “Go online and see their entire product line,” he suggested.

Durability is what developer Liz Solms looks for when she shops for products.

Solms is using sustainable or “green” materials to renovate apartments at Touraine in Center City, one of the buildings she co-owns around the country. She said she measured the value of these products by how long they would last.

“Time is money, right?” she said.

Jay Cipriani, president of Cipriani Builders, a Woodbury remodeling contractor, thinks so.

“Features to consider other than price might include durability, as well as whether the product will result in a healthier or safer environment” in your home, he said.

Another question to consider, Cipriani said: “Does it add value to the home?” He suggested looking for lesser-known names to get a good product and warranty. Look into how to buy directly from the manufacturer “rather than through big-box store or distributor,” he said.

Sometimes, immediate need compels us to buy something without considering all the factors.

It’s hot, and you need a window air conditioner. You find a website that lets you calculate the size you need – say, a 7,500-Btu unit. Several retailers are selling them for about $300, so finding the lowest price isn’t the overwhelming issue. What else do you need to think about before you buy?

“Sales tax is one,” Dranoff said. “Can you pick it up yourself, or do you need to have it delivered? Can you install it yourself, or do you need someone to do it for you?”

Not to mention these pertinent details: Can it make it through the doorway? Is the window too small or too big? How can you adjust the window opening so it will fit?

How close is the outlet? Is the outlet grounded? Will you need an electrician to install the proper outlet? How will the unit drain?

What about the warranty? Who will repair it if the unit breaks down? How easy is it to obtain parts?

If you plan to install something yourself, Cipriani said, “think about the hidden risks of self-installation, such as technical obstacles – plumbing or electrical, for example – or whether or not you need a permit before installation.”

Dranoff favors American-made products because of the availability of parts and people who know how to repair them if they break. He prefers established products to new ones.

“New is not necessarily better,” he said. “Consumer Reports suggests waiting a year on any product before you buy so that it will go through a cycle of consumer testing.”