The Serenata Beach Club in Ponte Vedra Beach was sold at auction on Thursday for $1.5 million.
North American Trading Group Inc. (NATG Inc.) was assigned the $11.6 foreclosure judgment by DLP Lending ahead of the auction although it’s unclear how much the debt was purchased for. The company said it eventually plans to transfer ownership of the club back to members.
“In the coming days, we will be introducing new interim management personnel to ensure a smooth transition and continued excellence at the club,” Kristen Merritt said in a statement, the Vice President of NATG Inc. “Additionally, we are actively working with Serenata Beach Equity Members to develop a transaction plan that would allow the members to eventually take ownership of the club.”
State records show the Merritts, a local family in Saint Johns, own the Delaware corporation. The property was sold in seconds.
There were two competing bids, one for $900 and another for $1.5 million. NATG Inc. won with a bid of $1,500,100. The assessed value of the property was $4.46M, according to the St. Johns County Property Appraiser.
News4JAX is still working to learn who the other two bidders were.
Michael Mota, the Transition Manager at the Serenata Beach Club since March, told News4JAX Wednesday he intended to submit a bid for the property at auction. It’s unclear which, if any, bids were his.
Merritt said Mota would no longer manage or be affiliated with the club in any way after reaching an agreement with NATG Inc.
An investor from Pennsylvania told News4JAX that while he intended to submit a bid for the club, he ultimately wasn’t fast enough this morning.
Serenata Beach Club Equity Members did not submit an official bid but said their efforts to make it “member-owned” are not over as they are working with NATG Inc. to transfer ownership.
As for the millions of dollars that are still owed on the property, real-estate attorney Barry Ansbacher explained that it’s likely the Butlers will be hit with a deficiency judgment for the remaining $12.5 million they owe on the mortgage. That amount depends on how much the debt was purchased for from the original mortgage lender.
If North American Trading bought the assignment from the lenders seeking foreclosure, Ansbacher said the amount they paid would be private information.
“Looking at the document, the group that bought the assignment, which is this North American Trading Group, and its partners, would have paid DLP Lending some amount of money or made some promises, so that now, if there’s a judgment in favor of DLP, it’s now a judgment in a favor of North American Trading,” Ansbacher said.
The troubled club has been the focus of several I-TEAM investigations as the owners were overcome with financial issues leading to temporary and sudden closures of the club and unpaid staff.
A judge ruled in favor of two different mortgage lenders in July who are owed a combined $14 million.
News4JAX learned of at least four interested parties that planned to bid on the club on Thursday. Anyone who made a bid had to make a 5% cash deposit beforehand.
Mota, a Rhode Island businessman, who has been managing the Serenata Beach Club since March, was one of the people interested in buying the club. Mota has been the subject of a podcast and multiple investigations by the Boston Globe which characterized him last year as a “businessman who is being chased for money in multiple states by creditors, investors, and vendors.”
Related: Serenata Beach Club to go up for foreclosure auction in September
“Over the last five months, our objective is really just keeping the asset alive, meaning keeping the club open. It’s a 20-plus year building, maintenance hasn’t been a top priority,” Mota said. “My job was just to get the place back open as best as possible and get it ready for what we see tomorrow, which is the auction.”
Mota was brought in by the then-owner of the club Molly Butler. The Rhode Island businessman said one of his business partners introduced him to Butler and he fell in love with the Ponte Vedra Beach property.
Mota said the Serenata Beach Club has not made money in years and he has a goal of making the club more sustainable and profitable. He was behind mandatory changes to membership spending in March requiring minimum monthly spending on food and drinks and members to start paying for beach chair rentals.
Part of Mota’s plans included potentially building a 70-room boutique hotel at the 2.6-acre vacant lot across the street from the beach club.
“Again, this is just to offset the costs the members have enjoyed for many years, a very, very low fee to join the club, and unfortunately, it was just never enough to actually sustain it,” Mota said. “Currently, it’s very difficult to keep it the way it is, only because it was never really set up for success and never brought in enough money to actually sustain itself. So any business knows that it has to have other revenue sources to make it succeed.”
A group of members, however, were trying to stop Mota’s bid, unhappy with how Mota’s been running things for the last six months. A decade-long beach club member and retired attorney, Jim Valenti, was leading the efforts by selling hundreds of equity memberships at $35,000 each.
Some members said they were worried about Mota’s past business ventures in Rhode Island. The Boston Globe reported that Mota leased a Providence events venue, The Skyline, that was facing eviction before a settlement was reached Monday.
News4JAX asked Mota how he could assure members of the beach club that something similar wouldn’t happen in Ponte Vedra Beach.
“So there is, there is some Boston Globe stories out there. They’re being sued. It’s fake news. You know, unfortunately, we live in a world where anybody can say anything, which you’re seeing right now. There’s an event venue that we have here in Rhode Island, and now the city is going to settle with us. We were never evicted. We never didn’t pay rent,” Mota said.
A spokesperson for the Boston Globe provided this statement in response to Mota’s comments about a pending lawsuit against an investigator reporter: “We stand by our reporting. The articles in question about Mr. Mota were thoroughly researched and accurate and were based on a wealth of information. Facts, no matter how disagreeable, are not defamatory.”
Ansbacher predicted on Wednesday that North American Trading Group Inc. was going to be the successful bidder.
“If North American Trading wants the property, they don’t have to put up any new money unless they want to bid more than the full judgment,” Ansbacher said. “If you think about it, whoever is buying this doesn’t really know what they’re buying in terms of what the conditions are and what’s going on with the property. So, it’s a lot of money you would have to put up blindly, cash on the barrel, and there’s no going back.”
The group will have to produce the funds for the property in the next 24 hours.