Looks like trouble on the John Edwards front.
When former North Carolina senator and Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards finally succeeded last month in selling his imposing Georgetown mansion for $5.2 million after it had languished on the market, the names of the buyers were not publicly disclosed.At the time, Edwards's spokeswoman told reporters that the house had been sold to an unidentified corporation. In reality, the buyers were Paul and Terry Klaassen, according to several sources and confirmed by Edwards's spokeswoman yesterday.
The wealthy founders of the nation's largest assisted-living housing chain for seniors, the Klaassens are currently cooperating with a government inquiry in connection with accounting practices and stock options exercised by them and other company insiders. They are also the focus of legal complaints by some of the same labor unions whose support Edwards has been assiduously courting for his presidential bid.
The grand 18th-century house had lingered on Washington's slowing real estate market for more than 18 months. The Edwardses paid $3.8 million in 2002 for the six-bedroom Federal-style house once owned by socialite Polly Fritchey, and they did substantial renovations. The final sale price was half a million dollars below the asking price but still $1.4 million more than the Edwardses paid four years earlier.
This looks bad, both in terms of the high-dollar profit from a seemingly corrupt source and what looks like a cover-up of the purchasers' identity by Edwards. What would the Dems say if this were a GOP candidate?
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Comments on Edwards House Sale Scandal
Nothing.
|| Posted by Dan, January 19, 2007 06:17 AM ||A renovated house in DC sold at a reasonable profit, but at a half million less than the asking price, and you think that's a scandal?
You're going to have to work much harder at generating false controversies . . .
Odd -- it is the ever-so-liberal WaPo raising the issue, along with liberal watchdog groups.
|| Posted by Jacob, January 19, 2007 09:32 AM ||But then again, we working stiffs on the right recognize that $1.4 million -- a 38% profit in 4 years -- is a pretty substantial chunk of change, and raises ethics questions that must be answered. If you Democrats see that sort of profits as insignificant, that speaks volumes about your connection to the working man.
And by the way -- did you notice this isn't the first unethical real estate transaction that Edwards has been a part of?
|| Posted by Jacob, January 19, 2007 09:34 AM ||This is an idiotic non-story. The appreciation is nothing outlandish for what happened to D.C. real estate values earlier this decade, and in fact Edwards sold for BELOW ASKING PRICE.
There was no cover-up of the buyers by Edwards, the deal was handled by real estate agents with any "cover-up," if there ever was one, handled by the buyers and/or their agent
This was a simple sale of a primary residence by Edwards to people he didn't personally know, the same as what EVERYONE does. The story doesn't come up with any personal or other relationship between Edwards and the buyer, and there's just nothing there to make the story worth writing and printing.
|| Posted by DCCyclone, January 19, 2007 12:47 PM ||Mymymymymy! Look at those liberals SPIN to try to preserve their hero from the taint of a second scandalous real estate transaction.
|| Posted by Jacob, January 19, 2007 12:49 PM ||Post a comment