Scaling Smithcliffs : Oceanfront Project Finally Cleared for Development
After more than a year as the only custom home site seller on the Orange County coastline, Irvine Co. is getting some competition.
A new tract of 26 custom ocean-view lots on a promontory overlooking Laguna Beach’s exclusive Emerald Bay is about to open for sale.
The last hurdle began clearing earlier this week when the Laguna Beach City Council signed a settlement agreement resolving a dispute over sewer line connections. The 10.4-acre parcel is located in unincorporated county territory on the city’s northern end. City officials have lost several court battles to stop the development and recently began expressing interest in annexing the property.
Developer Gary Brinderson, whose Newport Beach-based Brinderson Parent Co. is subdividing the property, said he expects land sales to begin in January.
And despite a relentless recession that has driven land prices down in most of Southern California, Brinderson says he doesn’t expect problems moving the parcels.
“There is just so much coastal property available,” he said. “This is going to be one of only two (custom lot) developments in Orange County, and there are a lot of people interested.”
Brinderson said he has received more than 50 inquiries from potential buyers in the past three months, since a sign with his company’s phone number was posted on the property.
Interest stems in part from the scarcity of ocean-view lots and in part from the dramatic locale. Smithcliffs, as the property is called, sits on a jagged peninsula that juts out into the Pacific at the south end of Emerald Bay. Homes on the ocean side of the property will sit on lots that end in a steep cliff about 200 feet above the beach.
The quarter-acre lots, to be priced from $595,000 to more than $3 million, are just three miles farther south on the coast from the Irvine Co.’s Pelican Point custom home sites at Newport Coast.
In the 14 months since opening sales at the 55-lot development, Irvine Co. has sold 18 of the parcels, which start at $900,000 and top out just above $3 million. Irvine Co. officials say Pelican Point sales are running slightly ahead of their initial projection of one sale a month.
Brinderson said he believes that he can sell all 26 of his lots in 18 months but added that he wouldn’t be disappointed if it takes twice that time in the current economy.
There certainly won’t be anything unusual about this phase of the project taking longer than planned. Brinderson bought Smithcliffs for $15 million in 1985 and has spent more than five years--almost doubling the cost of the project--seeking permission to subdivide it.
Planning began as soon as escrow closed in 1985, but in 1988 Brinderson threw out the initial plan for the property because of opposition from homeowners in neighboring Emerald Bay who wanted to keep the land undeveloped.
The new 26-lot plan was started in 1989 and was adopted by the county and the state Coastal Commission in 1990.
Work was delayed as the county fought off the lawsuits filed by Laguna Beach officials, who opposed the development for a variety of reasons including its environmental impact.
But during the summer of 1991 Brinderson was able to begin a massive project to save more than 70 large pines on the property.
Workers for Brinderson--whose principal business is heavy construction--dug out and boxed the pine trees, moved them to new locations within the development and replanted them at the front of each lot and along the property’s frontage on Coast Highway. Some of the boxes measured more than 15 feet square and 6 feet deep and Brinderson used a pair of 250-ton cranes to move them.
Total cost of the tree relocation project, Brinderson said, was in excess of $1 million. “But we did it because those big trees gives the place a feeling of permanence. We decided that if we were able to offer buyers (landscaping) that looked and felt like it has been here for years and years it would differentiate us.”
The trees actually have been on the property for decades. Smithcliffs has been a private estate since 1918, when Caroline Dobbins--who had purchased the land in 1915--built a home on the point overlooking the Pacific.
For a time her granddaughter, Florence (Pancho) Barnes, lived in a second home on the property. Much later, Barnes gained fame as owner of Pancho’s Fly Inn, the Lancaster road house frequented by hotshot test pilots, such as Chuck Yeager and Scott Crossfield, from nearby Edwards Air Force Base in the 1950s.
Dobbins sold the property in 1936 to Oscar Howard, an Oklahoma oilman who lived in Pasadena and used the Laguna Beach house as a summer residence.
In 1951, Howard’s widow sold the property to Lon Smith, an executive with Superior Oil Co., and the Smith family sold it to Brinderson in 1985.
Brinderson said the Smithcliffs project is his first foray into the residential market. The company he founded in 1965 is predominantly a heavy construction firm, building power plants, rail lines, water treatment facilities, hospitals and other large public and private facilities.
Brinderson Parent Co.--the name reflects its status as “parent” of a group of operating units--is based at Brinderson Towers, an office complex in Newport Beach that the company built in a joint venture with an investor that provided financing.
From Estate to Subdivision 1915: Caroline Dobbins--a “lady of imposing wealth,” according to historians--falls in love with Laguna Beach and purchases 20 acres. 1918: Dobbins builds a home overlooking the ocean; the estate is dubbed Dos Rocas. Later, she adds a home for her daughter, Wilhelmina; son-in-law, Thaddeus Lowe Jr., son of a Civil War spy for the Union Army, railroad magnate and hotel builder, and 18-year-old granddaughter, Florence. 1923: Florence marries the Rev. Rankin Barnes but has trouble adjusting to life as a minister’s wife, often shocking parish members when she acts as hostess at teas and church functions. The marriage ends in divorce. 1927: Whilhelmina dies, and Florence inherits her mother’s house. Florence, a flamboyant favorite of the Hollywood movie crowd, hosts loud, lavish parties attended by everyone who is anyone, including actor Ramon Navarro and director Eric Von Stroheim. 1929: Calling Florence’s parties “too wild,” her grandmother insists that she move her home to another part of the property. Architect Aubrey St. Clair completes the arduous task, adding 13 guest bedrooms and a swimming pool with portholes so that guests in the basement of the house can watch people in the pool. Florence, a pioneer aviator, later adds a runway. 1934: Florence’s fortunes “fall on bad times,” and she moves to Lancaster, in the Mojave Desert, where she owns a bar and motel made famous by the book, “The Right Stuff.” 1936: Dobbins sells the property to Oscar Howard, a wealthy Oklahoma oilman, who calls the estate “Howardcliffs.” 1951: Howard’s widow sells the estate to Lon Smith, an executive with Superior Oil Co., for an estimated $200,000. He renames the estate “Smithcliffs.” 1979: Smith dies at the age of 87, leaving the property to his wife, Marguerite. 1985: Smith’s widow sells the property to Greg Brinderson for $15 million as a “life estate,” meaning that it is effectively her home until she dies. Smith’s friends contend that she sold the property thinking that it would remain intact as a family estate. 1989: Marguerite Smith dies at 96. 1990: Brinderson files plans to develop a 26-home gated community on Smithcliffs. Sources: Los Angeles Times Orange County Editorial Library; “Emerald Bay 1906-1976” by Elizabeth H. Quilter; Brinderson Parent Co.
