You may not know Irvine’s National Recreational Properties Inc. But you may have stumbled across one of its infomercials on a Saturday afternoon or during a late night in front of the TV.
In them, Erik Estrada, star of the 1970s series “CHiPs,” pitches the good life at developments with names such as “California Pines” and “Hot Springs Village.”
Instead of cruising tough highways as Estrada did playing motorcycle cop Frank “Ponch” Poncherello, the actor now is biking in the park, playing tennis or golfing at one of National Recreational’s developments.
“He has zero ego,” Jeffrey Frieden, one of National Recreational’s two principals, said of the company’s spokesman.
The actor pitches estate-size lots at killer prices,but at high borrowing rates,and urges potential buyers to take a free weekend trip to see for themselves.
Estrada, who went on to star in Mexican telenovelas after “CHiPs,” also pitches the developments in Spanish.
Urban living it’s not. The sites are somewhat removed from civilization, though affordable.
California Pines is near the Oregon border in rural Northern California. Another one, Hot Springs Village, is in central Arkansas. Ocean Shores is on the Washington coastline about 130 miles from Seattle.
National Recreational sells parcels at its developments. Buyers have to build their own homes. The company helps with that, too, referring buyers to homebuilders.
The lots have basics such as roads and utilities in place and zoning for houses, according to Frieden and his partner Robert Friedman, a high school buddy.
The pair graduated from Loara High School in Anaheim in 1979.
Using infomercials to sell land is unusual for developers. Unlike programs selling steam cleaners and cooking devices, National Recreational’s lots don’t come in a few easy payments of $19.99: The parcels sell from $9,000 to $60,000.
The principals declined to give their yearly revenue or talk about land holdings. They’ve scooped up thousands of lots in California, Washington, Arkansas and Florida.
The company sells to a variety of buyers, according to Friedman. Most, especially in Florida, are looking for a place to retire, he said. Others are seeking a vacation home or a new place to live,though jobs and commuting could be an issue at some locations.
“A lot of our buyers are homebuilders,” Friedman said.
National Recreational also extends credit to buyers who can’t get it on their own,at a price. They advertise a $9,900 lot in Arkansas for $149 a month at an interest rate of 15%, about twice what a borrower with good credit could get on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage here.
The company is expanding. In spring, the principals paid $8.5 million for a new headquarters building at 1 Mauchly in Irvine. They’re occupying 45,000 square feet of the 65,000-square-foot building, taking double the amount of space they had before.
National Recreational employs 110 people in Irvine and another 300 full- and part-time workers nationwide, according to the principals.
The partners also organize land auctions. Through the years, they said they’ve dabbled in other businesses, including stereo stores in the 1980s.
National Recreational’s business model is simple enough: find troubled masterplanned communities, buy big chunks of land, fix the problems, then sell the lots.
Sometimes the problem simply is exposure,hence the infomercials. Other times, National Recreational helps with financing, wrapping up development or improving community designs, the partners said.
“We’re good at fixing problems,” Friedman said.
Friedman said he spends much of his time finding and buying land. Frieden is president and chief operating officer. He handles the day-to-day stuff.
California Pines
One of National Recreational’s first big projects was California Pines, where the company still is selling lots. California Pines dates back to the 1970s, long before National Recreational got involved. It covers some 30,000 acres nestled in an area of pine forests, mountains, lakes and ponds in the far northeastern corner of the Golden State.
Frieden and Friedman got involved in California Pines in the 1990s.
During the real estate slump of the early 1990s, the partners worked together with developers to unload homes or with banks looking to sell foreclosed properties.
They boasted of selling 65 homes in one day at an auction. The homes were in Moreno Valley and near Lake Matt-hews.
“Some other developers came to the auction and saw what we had done,” Frieden said.
As the 1990s wore on, the real estate market began to pick up. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. had some lots at California Pines it wanted to sell. Frieden and his partner came in with the highest bid. National Recreational was born.
“They are just re-marketing something done in 1970s and 1980s,” said Scott Kessler, planning director for Modoc County, which includes California Pines.
National Recreational keeps busy by snatching up lots sold at county auctions and by buying them directly from property owners, Kessler said. The county auctions land seized from owners who have failed to pay property taxes for at least five years, he said.
The partners look to bring exposure to their lots. Their goal seems to be to attract out-of-state buyers to little-known projects, not all of which are as remote as California Pines.
Infomercials and spokesman Estrada are key. A few years ago, the partners said they were looking for a celebrity pitchman and called several agents. Estrada’s agent turned out to be “cool,” as did the actor himself, they said.
Estrada even was good-natured about showing up at an Anaheim YMCA charity event, they said, and comes to the company’s yearly holiday party.
Estrada’s appeal to Hispanics is a bonus, the partners said. When they first signed him up several years ago, they weren’t targeting Hispanics.
Now many of National Recreational’s customers are Hispanic, Frieden said.
“They’re a big segment of the population,it’s really that simple,” he said. “If we had that many Yugoslavians, we would be running ads for Yugoslavians.”
Spanish-Language Ads
The company does 30-second ads on the Spanish-language networks Telemundo and Univision, but not infomercials. Frieden said it’s too expensive to buy that much airtime, a sign of the economic might of Hispanics.
Part of the partners’ pitch: they offer a chance at property ownership to some who otherwise might not be able to afford it or qualify for a real estate loan.
Selling prospective buyers on lots doesn’t come cheap. The company pays for flights and hotel rooms for weekend visitors to its developments.
The trips typically cost the company $1,000 a pop. The company asks for a $295 refundable deposit to try and weed out those looking for a free vacation, the partners said.
Visiting a property is key to closing a sale, the partners said, though they insist there’s “no pressure.”
“We will not sell you a property unless you have looked at it,” Friedman said.
