OXNARD : Ruggles House to Be Sold to 2 Executives

Oxnard officials voted Tuesday to sell a $185,000 house the city owns in Heritage Square as part of a plan to turn property ownership in the area over to private citizens.

Built in 1991, the Ruggles House on West 7th Street was modeled after an 1885 revival-style ranch house on East Wooley Road. The two-story, light-brown shingle house is one of only two replicas in Heritage Square.

“All the other buildings are restored,” said Jim Ludwig, a partner in KL/Heritage Square Partners and a consultant to the city’s redevelopment agency. “They attempted to move [the house on East Wooley Road] and it fell apart in transit . . . Nobody could put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

Hector Alvarez, owner of H & N Books, an accounting firm in the building, is buying the house with his sister-in-law, Mercedes Sosa. Sosa will move her real estate brokerage firm into the building.

Other tenants include an attorney’s office, an insurance agency and a psychologist.

“We plan to leave [the house] as it is,” Alvarez said. “I don’t like changes and I like the tenants.”

A private developer built the Ruggles House, but the city took over the building in 1992 when the builder defaulted on the loan. The city will lose $2,010 in monthly rental income from the sale but will be spared $525 in monthly maintenance costs, according to city documents. The transaction will provide the city with monthly mortgage income of $942.79 and additional tax revenues.

The city will remain the owner of the meeting hall in Heritage Square. But according to Ludwig, the city’s redevelopment agency has already sold five of 15 city-owned structures in Heritage Square to private individuals.

“Private owners will take more pride in and bring more owners to the neighborhood,” Ludwig said. “This area is in need of tender, loving care and economic vitality.”