Straight from David Sacks with respect to the sale of 2845 Broadway which we first reported having sold for $20,000,000 last month but Trulia just reported having sold for $34,500,000 with “a portion of the sale…recorded as alternative personal property for tax reasons” according to their “in-the-know” sources:
There’s no “tax tomfoolery”. You correctly reported the sale price of 2845 Broadway when you checked the public records. Trulia didn’t bother to. It’s just sloppy reporting on their part. As the publication that appears to do actual research and fact-checking, rather than just quoting unnamed sources, you should have stuck to your guns and stood by your original story.
That said, I remain a fan of your blog.
Cheers and agreed, but we’ve always stood by our due dilligence and story. As we wrote yesterday, “we have reviewed the public records which pegs the recorded sale price at $20,000,000…which begs the question, if the “in-the-know” sale price Truila is reporting is correct…,” a question that is now moot.
this statement does not counter the $20 million ‘recorded’ and $14.5 million (or any other amount) ‘unrecorded’
In the words of Da Ali G. Respect.
did you expect Sacks to say, “yes, I’m guilty of tax fraud”??
and of course the public records would reflect the $20m, not $34m, because Trulia is alleging a familiar scheme of under-reporting to City Hall the total ‘consideration’ paid for a house.
innocent until proven guilty, but I’d like the assessor to take a closer look.
The pat on the back to SS combined with the torpedo at Trulia is kind of transparent. Trulia obviously checked the records too, but their sources said there was more to the story than the public records reveal.
[Editor’s Note: Having not even known the sale had closed escrow, Trulia had not reviewed the records and was simply relying on their “in-the-know” sources who apparently didn’t actually know.]
Though on the other hand, Trulia has retracted their claim.
New buyers like David Sacks and Mark Pincus should be given high praise. They are helping drive econmy. Bring in new money to San Francisco. Unlike other Millionaire/Billionaires, they are spending it.
The highest praise should be also given to Peter Sperling. Not only did he 1) purchase the property at a premium, but 2) he spent millions creating this house and 3) sold it probably at a loss with the assurance more millions will be spent before it is ready for occupation.
The style has been the subject of much criticism on SS, but for one I like it. Then again, I am a big fan of post-modernistic classic inspired revivals like Ricardo Boffil’s work in Montpellier’s Antigone.
From the original articles I read 6 years ago, did he really buy a quarry in France for its gorgeous limestone? Maybe he could sell it to Pincus for his upcoming underground mausoleum (I would make it an inverted pyramid – after all why not go all the way?). The Billionaire Row moniker is well deserved.