Landmark Hotel owner Halsey Minor has put to rest the hopes of any residents who were ready or willing to buy into Minor’s Albemarle estate.
William Casterline, Jr. of Blankingship & Keith, P.C., listed as the substitute trustees, has confirmed that the foreclosure sale on the primary lien for Minor’s 206-acre Fox Ridge property in Albemarle County—officially made out to Minor’s Fox Ridge Farms Holdings, LLC—has been cancelled.
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Halsey Minor |
“The mortgage on Fox Ridge Farm has been made current,” says David Pettit, an attorney who represents Minor. Pettit declined any further comment.
Minor also confirmed it to C-VILLE: “The mortgage is current and up to date as is my lender abuse suit in California federal court against ML [Private Finance, LLC] and First Republic [Bank],” he tells C-VILLE via e-mail. Minor contends that his personal financial woes were dependent on Merryl Lynch subsidiaries’ freeze on a line of credit of $25 million linked to several works of art. Because his assets were frozen, Minor says, his liquidity decreased and he faced foreclosure on many of his personal properties.
The trustees’ sale, originally set for Thursday, February 18 at 3pm, was issued for a Deed of Trust dated December 2007 in the principal amount of $6.52 million. According to county records, the estate was bought by Fox Ridge Farms Holdings, LLC, from William Coleman, Jr. in 1999. The property is currently assessed at $3.79 million.
This wasn’t Minor’s first financial woe with this specific property. Last month, he fought off potential bidders for the second loan used to finance the property, with a $1.3 million winning bid made by his Charlottesville attorney. That sale, however, was subjected to a lien from the first lender, First Republic Bank—a division of Bank of America with headquarters in San Francisco—which would have been contested in this cancelled sale.
Even before the first foreclosure sale took place, Minor told C-VILLE, “Unfortunately the chances of it being sold in foreclosure are as great as Thomas Jefferson returning from the dead to renounce liberty and justice for all. No one should break open their piggy bank prematurely.”
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