I wrote stories in February and April of last year about my friend, Chuck, and a lot we owned in Rotunda West, Florida. We purchased it over fifty years ago as an investment. We were young entrepreneurs who knew nothing about real-estate investing but took the plunge anyway. We made a plan to sell the lot last year, but the coronavirus and his passing through the schedule off. His wife, Linda, and I made the leap and put it on the market in late February, and it sold three weeks later. The closing was Tuesday six days short of a year of my last entry about Chuck.
We sold it for 4.2 times more than our initial investment. Most would consider that a good return. The initial numbers look fine until you factor in the over 50 years we owned the property. We paid monthly installments over the first ten years, paying it off in 1981. We’ve been paying property taxes every year since the purchase. When the developer transferred the development to the owners, we began to pay into a homeowners association.
I tried to get Chuck to agree to sell several times over the years. We had a heart to heart in 2006 when similar lots were selling for over $120,000 to European investors. He saw the land going higher and refused to move forward. We discussed it a couple more times, and I learned later that Linda tried to persuade him as well, but he wouldn’t budge. Two years later the bottom fell out of the market, and our potential payday was lost.
If we would have invested a similar amount in Amazon when it went public, we’d be multi-millionaires today. We didn’t, so we aren’t. Joint ownership of the lot was the tie that bound us together. I believe Chuck wanted to stay in contact with Ruth and me, and the joint ownership insured we would. When his health declined last year, he knew it was time to let go. The coronavirus delayed the sale as people hunkered down. When we listed the property, Linda hoped the sale would proceed quickly, as she needed a new roof on her house. About that same time, I asked Ruth to compile a list of things we need to add to our new condo. Interestingly, the proceeds from the sale should cover the cost of everything. It’s like we put money in a piggy bank over a period of fifty years and broke it open in time to meet these expenses.
The closing on the property was delayed several days because the earnest money check was delayed in transit from Massachusetts, the home of the man who purchased the lot. It arrived about a week after the expected date. The financial delays cleared, and we received our proceeds from the sale on Tuesday, April 20th, one day short of the first anniversary of Chuck’s passing on April 21st, 2020. I guess he wanted to be involved right to the very end.