For the first time in 20 years, Laguna Beach’s Hershey estate is up for sale.
The multilevel, 5,800-square-foot home used to be a beach getaway for the Hershey family in the late 1920s and early 1930s, right about the time their Pennsylvania company started cranking out Hershey’s Kisses.
“Since then it’s been totally rebuilt,” said Lee Ann Canaday, owner of Re/Max Fine Homes, Canaday Group in Laguna Beach.
The sellers, a pair of wealthy empty nesters, have renovated through the years.
“Every single room has been gutted and redone, and they added on,” Canaday said.
The family built a garage with room for four cars. They added outdoor fireplaces, including one off the master bedroom on the third level.
The home has six bedrooms, including a home theater.
The Hershey estate has been on the market for about two months. Canaday said she hopes to sell the house by the summer.
It’s priced at $5.8 million to $6.9 million.
Other nearby homes have sold within the past six months for $805,000 to $10 million, with an average price per square foot of $833, according to Seattle-based online housing brokerage Redfin.com. The Hershey home is priced at $1,000 to $1,181 per square foot.
The sellers are finished raising their children and now they want a smaller house, according to Canaday, who declined to say who they are.
“They just don’t need that big of a house anymore,” she said.
A catered, invitation-only open house is set for March 12.
Canaday said she plans to do a lot of advertising for the Hershey estate. She regularly has ads on the back covers of Dream Homes, Homes & Land and Distinctive Homes. She also advertises in newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, as well as local publications, including the Business Journal.
One of the ways she reaches locals is through a half-hour TV show that airs Saturday mornings on KDOC-TV.
She’s been doing the show since 1992.
Canaday said she’ll film the upcoming open house and present clips on her show.
“I sell directly off the show,” she said. “When my show’s running my website goes crazy.”
Canaday has offices in Newport Beach, Laguna Beach and Costa Mesa. She’s been selling real estate for 30 years, nine of which she spent teaching algebra on the side at Long Beach Unified School District.
Her first year selling real estate, she made four times her teaching salary.
“But I didn’t want to quit teaching,” she said. “Then I got married and my husband asked: ‘What the heck are you thinking?’”
Of course, selling luxury homes these days isn’t what it used to be.
“Every deal is extra work,” she said. “It’s not like we’re order takers anymore.”
Billion-Dollar Year
Newport Beach’s Surterre Properties Inc. reported $1 billion in 2010 home sales, up 36% from 2009.
Surterre’s sales were boosted by multimillion-dollar home sales. It sold five homes worth $10 million or more, including a $14.5 million home in Newport Coast.
In all, it represented 30 buyers and sellers in 2010, according to Gary Legrand, Surterre’s president.
“We’ve hit bottom on the under $2 million market,” Legrand said.
There are fewer bargains, which has pushed more buyers into the higher end of the luxury home market, he said.
This year is off to a good start, he said. January closings were up from a year earlier.
Surterre also has been showing more homes than last year, according to Legrand. Like an auto dealer, if the seller can get a buyer to visit the home, that’s half the battle, he said.
Home Photos
Most people begin their home searches online, so a good photo can make all the difference, said Laguna Hills photographer Gar Benedick.
He photographs luxury homes here for real estate agents to use on the web or in brochures. He also does virtual tours, which many realtors use to show off a 360-degree view of a home.
Interior shots are crucial to showing off a home, he said.
A great interior shot allows people to imagine their furniture in the home, according to Benedick.
“You’re trying to show the person the space, how one room relates to the other one,” he said.
Benedick said he used to have about 10 steady clients. But business has slowed some, he said.
“Fortunately, I’m a jack of all trades,” Benedick said.
He also shoots landscapes and architecture and has picked up corporate media work, he said.
