Anthony “Tony” Moiso has one thing left to do before he turns the family business over to the next generation: develop the last big piece of ranch land in Orange County.
Moiso, chief executive of Rancho Mission Viejo LLC, sees his plan to develop 23,000 acres of South County land as a way to ensure his family’s roots.
Earlier this month, the county Board of Supervisors unanimously approved Moiso’s development plan, which calls for 14,000 homes and about 5 million square feet of shops and offices in the county’s southern foothills near Mission Viejo.
“It’s still a ranch,” Moiso said of his family’s land. “The approval we just got means it’s going to be a ranch forever.”
Rather than talk about new homes for a housing-starved county, Moiso focuses on the 15,000 acres the plan sets aside as permanent open space, including land for cattle ranching and farming.
The project marks the latest chapter in a long history for the Rancho Mission Viejo clan, which traces its ties to the land back to 1882.
Rancho Mission Viejo won the longevity honor at the Nov. 18 Family Owned Business awards luncheon put on by the Business Journal and California State University, Fullerton’s Family Business Council.
Along with The Irvine Company, Rancho Mission Viejo is one of the two biggest landowners in the county. It’s also a major developer, farmer and rancher.
The company keeps revenue and other details private. But it’s no secret that South County land ripe for residential development can sell for $1 million an acre, once approvals, utilities and other basics are in place.
The Families
The Moiso, O’Neill, and Avery families make up Rancho Mission Viejo. In the past few decades, they’ve had a big impact on the county, from the creation of the O’Neill Regional Park in Trabuco Canyon to the development of Mission Viejo, Rancho Santa Margarita, Las Flores and, most recently, Ladera Ranch.
Moiso, 65, runs the operation. He meets once a week with his uncle Richard J. O’Neill, 81, who’s chairman. Moiso’s daughter, Anne Marie Moiso, is director of marketing and corporate relations.
Moiso has three other daughters who aren’t active in the business: Katrina, Cristy and Francesca.
The family’s land holdings are massive by today’s standards. But they’re actually a fraction of what they once were, spanning 230,000 acres from Aliso Creek to Oceanside.
The ranch’s history dates back to 1845 when California land baron Don Juan Forster acquired Ranchos Trabuco and La Misi & #243;n Vieja in what now is OC. It didn’t hurt that Forster’s brother-in-law was Pio Pico, governor of Mexican-held California.
In 1873, Forster added Rancho Santa Margarita y las Flores to his holdings, land that’s now part of San Diego County.
A year after Forster’s 1881 death, two Irish immigrants who had made their fortunes in America acquired the ranch. They were Richard O’Neill Sr.,grandfather of Richard J. O’Neill, Rancho Mission Viejo’s chairman,and James Flood.
Flood made his fortune in the silver mines of Nevada. The elder O’Neill owned several meat markets near the docks of San Francisco.
Their heirs formed the Santa Margarita Co., which was dissolved in 1939 and the ranch was split in two.
The Floods took the San Diego County portion. Richard O’Neill Jr.,son of the land buyer,retained the OC portion.
In 1942, the Marine Corps absorbed the entire San Diego portion to expand Camp Pendleton. The Marines took 17-miles of coastline, the only stretch of the ranch that reached the Pacific Ocean.
Chairman Richard J. O’Neill graduated from Beverly Hills High School in 1941 and joined the Navy. He said he thought he had signed up for the Naval Reserve but found himself on a ship manning a machine gun during World War II.
O’Neill, an ardent Democrat, got his first taste of politics in the Navy, registering sailors to vote.
He would spend a lifetime in politics, rising to the Democratic Party’s chairmanship of California in 1978. He also headed the party in Southern California and said he helped it gain ground in OC.
After the Navy, O’Neill invested in restaurants and bars. The family still has an interest in some eateries, including El Adobe, Mission Promenade and Swallows Inn in San Juan Capistrano.
O’Neill’s wife Donna O’Neill lost a six-month battle to cancer in 2002 after 50 years of marriage. She helped start the Rancho Mission Land Conservancy, a 1,250-acre wilderness preserve.
Leading the modern development of the ranch is Tony Moiso, who is the great grandson of Richard O’Neill Sr. and the son of Alice O’Neill Avery and James Moiso.
Before Moiso’s time, in the 1930s, some 17,500 acres were sold and later became Coto de Caza, Dove Canyon, Caspers Regional Park and other properties.
Moiso has two siblings not active in development: brother Jerome Moiso and half brother Douglas Avery.
The Averys, O’Neills and Moisos have developed much of their land themselves.
In 1964, Tony Moiso formed the Mission Viejo Co. with another patriarch of real estate here, Donald Bren, chairman of the Irvine Co. Moiso was in his 20s at the time.
From the earliest days, Moiso said his uncle let him spearhead development.
“My uncle’s a wonderful guy,” Moiso said. “He’s allowed me for 40 years to run with it.”
The two don’t always see eye to eye on politics,Moiso’s a Republican. But the political debates have been civil, he said.
“I did vote for George Bush. He doesn’t challenge that,” Moiso said.
In 1983, Moiso revived the Santa Margarita Co. and began developing 5,000-acre Rancho Santa Margarita. Things went smoothly until the real estate downturn of the 1990s.
Amid the recession, Moiso said he and his uncle were “on the hook” with banks since they had borrowed money to fund development. Moiso said the family had to sell assets it had planned on keeping, including a golf course and shopping centers.
Even worse, other family members blamed them.
“The money had dried up,” Moiso said. “But we made it through that. There are good times and bad times.”
Indeed, Moiso said one of the hardest things about running a family business is the sense of “entitlement” among some relatives who are not involved.
“There is a little bit of a lack of understanding of how hard people work,” Moiso said. “The biggest challenge is keeping everybody happy.”
The family business bounced back with Ladera Ranch. The 4,000-acre masterplanned community near Mission Viejo has seen strong sales amid an eight-year bull market in housing.
Rancho Mission Viejo has started work on the last couple of villages in Ladera.
This time the family is keeping ownership of three shopping centers, four apartment complexes, two complexes for seniors, and some medical and commercial buildings, Moiso said. The family has partners in some of the projects at Ladera.
Moiso’s daughter, Anne Marie Moiso, so far is the most visible member of the next generation active in the business. Two of Tony Moiso’s sons-in-law, Marc Lamkin and Jeremy Laster, work for him.
Rancho Mission Viejo faces some tough fights ahead as it pushes its development plan. Even with county approval, further opposition from environmental groups is expected.
And the county still must review specific neighborhood plans and issue building permits. State and federal agencies are set to weigh in on habitat issues and other matters.
Succession Planning
Even so, it’s unclear how much will be left for the next generation to do. The last phase of the ranch could take 20 years to develop, so much depends on when Tony Moiso retires.
Moiso said he has discussed with his uncle the need for a succession plan, though he declined to give details. He said he and his uncle are addressing difficult questions, such as which family member should be involved or whether the business needs to be headed by a family member at all.
One option: have family members sit on a board that oversees managers who are not part of the family.
Anne Marie Moiso said by the time the last phase of the ranch is done she’ll be in her 50s.
“We’ll definitely be busy,” she said of her generation.
In addition to ranching and farming, she said her generation expects to manage shopping centers and other properties.
Of course they could choose to develop somewhere else, Tony Moiso said of his children.
He said he is adamant about keeping the family’s tradition of ranching and farming. The family has 500 acres of lemon trees and still herds cows, he said.
