Realty Agents Rush to Help Quayles Open Some Doors

Orange County real estate firms wasted no time Friday in offering their services to Vice President Dan Quayle after The Times disclosed that the Quayles may buy a vacation home in the area.

Quayle press secretary David Beckwith said the vice president’s office in Washington received “more than a few calls” from real estate firms throughout the state, including several from Orange County.

“It was the big real estate chains,” he said.

Beckwith said Century 21 was one of the major firms that called, but he declined to name others. Irvine-based Century 21 is the nation’s largest residential broker.

A spokesman for the company said Friday: “Any one of our franchises could have called, and we don’t know which one. It was probably an individual broker.”

Officials at Newport Beach-based Coldwell Banker, the nation’s third-largest residential broker, said that Lauren Temkin, one of their Santa Barbara agents, mailed some information to the vice president’s office about properties in her area, but added that other Coldwell Banker agents in Orange County probably took similar action.

Beckwith told The Times on Thursday that the Quayles were so impressed with California on their four-day tour last week that they wanted to find a vacation home, probably in Southern California.

Beckwith cautioned Friday that “Northern California has just as good a shot” at attracting the Quayles as Southern California has. He added that no broker has been hired to scout a place for the Quayles. “All this is speculation at this point. . . . We’ve been discouraging real estate brokers from calling, but we’ve been taking names. Orange County has been mentioned.”

The Quayles visited a McDonnell Douglas plant during their visit but otherwise saw little of Orange County.

“They didn’t give Orange County a very hard look this time, but what they saw, they liked,” Beckwith said. “They enjoyed their visit to Disneyland. Next time, we hope to spend more time in Orange County.”

Beckwith said Marilyn Quayle has a sister who lives in Los Gatos in Northern California, but added this has not influenced the family’s deliberations so far.

Quayle and his family plan to spend a week in California next month and will be in Los Angeles on Aug. 24 and 25.