The Hialeah Gardens Building Story

1968

If only a building could talk

Written 2010 and Re-written 4/2013* 2,659 Words

By Howard Yasgar

Whenever I drive by a small building, I wonder if the building has as interesting a history as my own little building that was located located at 9750 NW 79 Ave in Hialeah Gardens Florida.

This story is all about my 30 x 60-foot building that I built in 1968 in the town of Hialeah Gardens Florida.

When the building was first built in 1968, it was the only building that you could see in Hialeah Gardens.

The building was standing in a vast expanse of undeveloped and barren Hialeah Gardens property.

As the building was being built, I watched its progress every day as I drove on the Palmetto Expressway and exited onto 103rd Street exit ramp.

I could watch the progress of the building because it was the only building there.

Today there are so many warehouses in Hialeah Gardens, my little building has become lost in a jungle of giant buildings.

It was in 1968, when I had some money saved, and I needed to find a small building that I could rent. My intentions were to process and refine platinum from aircraft sparkplugs.

I knew that the building needed to be far away from the general population because of the corrosiveness and odor of the acids that I needed to use.

So, this story begins when I started searching the real estate ads in the Miami newspapers, I did it for several months, but I could never find any small buildings available.

I saw that they were advertising a new industrial park on the Tamami Trail, so I went there, but they

only had a beautiful big concrete archway built and nothing else.

When I told them I wanted an 1800 square-foot building they laughed at me because it was too

Small for them to consider.

In 1968 my friend Lou Gladstein stopped by my house on his way back to Haiti.

Lou was a good friend and he had been the best man at my wedding and I was working with him removing the railroad from Haiti.

Lou said he had some business to discuss with the Police Chief of a small town called Hialeah Gardens.

I didn’t ask Lou too many questions about what kind of business he did with the Police Chief.

The next afternoon, we went to the combination Hialeah Gardens town hall and police station, and that’s where I met the Hialeah Gardens Police Chief.

Turns out he was a nice enough fellow just about my age, who spoke with a heavy Alabama accent.

After a tour of his office and jail cell, the Chief came out with a big map of Hialeah Gardens and he spread it out on the town hall stage.

The chief pointed out that about 90% of Hialeah Gardens was still just vacant land.

The chief suggested I speak with his friend Mort Bernstein, he was the best real estate agent in Hialeah Gardens.

Turns out Mort Bernstein was the only real estate agent in Hialeah Gardens.

Mort worked out of a house trailer on Okeechobee Road which was the town’s main drag.

Mort said he had a perfect building lot for me.

He said the lot was 50 feet wide by 180 feet long, and it was on solid ground.

He said that solid ground was important, and he went on to explain.

A lot of the land in Hialeah Gardens was filled in over a dump. Mort felt that any future buildings might be subject to settling and cracking.

Mort said the original landowner, Mr. Pfeffer, had sold tons of rock and dirt to the state of Florida, to build the Palmetto Expressway.

Then to fill in the huge hole he had dug, he opened a dump, charging people to dump their refuse there.

When the dump was full, Mr. Pfeffer spread earth over it and then sold the land for development.

A large portion of the land was then sold to the Lowell Dunn Co. At the time Lowell Dunn was a large contractor in Hialeah Gardens.

The Lowell Dunn Co. Then leveled the land and put in streets.

Mort said it would cost me .67 cents a square foot or about $6,000.00. for the land.

It scared the hell out of me because it was almost all the money I had.

However, I went forward and purchased the land, and Mort did all the paperwork for me.

Mort said now that I bought the land, I should give him a drawing of the building that I wanted and he would quote to build it for me.

That night I went home and drew a 30 x 60-foot building, with a small office and laboratory in the front.

I showed it to Mort, and the next day he said he would build a concrete block building with a prestressed concrete roof for $10,000.00.

I borrowed $10,000.00 on a simple handshake from my grandfather and Mort said he would start on the building right away.

Every day I took the Palmetto Expressway home, and just before I got off the 103 Street exit ramp I

looked over to my left hoping to see my new building going up.

About a week went by and I saw workers there, then I saw a cement truck there, they were pouring the concrete floor.

How exciting, because over the next few weeks the four walls of my building had started going up.

Then one afternoon, before getting off the expressway, I looked for my building and it wasn’t there.

I couldn’t imagine what happened, so I drove to where the building was.

The four cement block walls were lying on the ground, broken into a million pieces.

I a panic I drove right over to Mort’s office.

It was late afternoon but Mort was still there, he was sitting behind his desk with his head in his hands.

Mort said, “I know, I know”

He said his subcontractor was a jerk. He didn’t support the walls while waiting to put wooden forms up and pour concrete into the corners.

Mort said any profit he would have made was now gone, but he would find another contractor and

finish the building for me.

Mort was a man of his word and he found another contractor.

However, this one didn’t speak English, nor did he know how to read blueprints.

He finished the building, but he put the drain for the laboratory sink and the toilet in the wrong wall.

I thought about complaining, but in those days, there was no one to complain to, and I felt sorry

for Mort.

Before I knew it, Lowell Dunn put in roads, and there was electricity and water extended to my building.

This was just the beginning of the story about my little 1800 square foot building.

I operated NEARCO refining for five years in the building, with my good friend Miguel Marquez working with me in the evenings and weekends.

We were processing aircraft sparkplugs to recover the platinum contacts in them.

Because the property behind the building was empty, I rented it to a scrap dealer named Fred Stein.

Fred would unload and store all kinds of junk he picked up.

One day, Mort Bernstein came by and asked me if I wanted to purchase the 50-foot Florida power and light easement, behind the property, he said we could fence it in and give a key to FPL. With their permission we could park cars or temporarily store goods there.

The price was $1800.00 so I purchased it.

Mort said he would do all the paperwork for me.

I trusted Mort, that was my first mistake, and I assumed the property taxes for the FPL easement would be included with my regular building tax, that was my second mistake.

After several years, my good friend and employee Miguel wanted to go into business rebuilding

automotive solenoids.

The sparkplug business was declining as jet engines were now replacing all the reciprocating

engines in the aircraft industry.

So, to assist Miguel, I allowed him to use the rear of the little Hialeah Gardens building for free.

Why not, Miguel was my friend and employee for many years.

Eventually, as the sparkplug business declined, I stopped using the building, but Miguel continued

running his rebuilding company there.

Next, my friend, Fred Stein the scrap man, stopped paying the $125.00 per month rent, leaving me with tons of junk in the yard.

One day while paying building taxes, I noticed the property tax bill on the Hialeah Gardens building was $2400.00, also I had been paying a small electric and water bill every month.

I suggested to Miguel that he start paying some rent to cover the tax bills.

He was very upset and said, “How much do you think this building is worth?”

I said, this building is worth about $1250.00 a month.

I thought Miguel would hit the ceiling.

To calm him down, I said I don’t expect you to pay that amount, but you should pay something to help cover the taxes, how does $400.00 a month sound?

He didn’t like it but he agreed.

About four months passed and Miguel invited us to his house in East Hialeah.

His East Hialeah house was in an industrial neighborhood, and Miguel had built a two-story building behind the house and he informed me he was leaving my Hialeah Gardens building.

What he did hurt my feelings, but In a way it was the best thing that could have happened.

I started cleaning up the property, I even had a bulldozer level the yard including the FPL easement that I owned.

I put a for rent sign in the window and by the second day the building was rented for $1250.00 a month.

The new tenant was “Jerrys Welding Service”, owned by Jerry and his two sons.

Jerry installed trailer hitches and sold camper tops which they stored on the fenced FPL

easement.

Everything went smoothly for a few years, then one day, Ed White, Jerrys son called me.

He said, “Some guy on a bulldozer is threatening to bulldoze down the fence on the FPL easement.

my father is getting his gun to shoot the guy.

I said don’t shoot, find out what is going on, find out what company the guy works for.

Ed, did, and got his business card, the company was “The Real Estate Group”.

I contacted my attorney Stanley Haves.

Stanley told me that I didn’t own the FPL easement, the Real Estate Group did.

I suspected my attorney was a bit too friendly with The Real Estate Group, but there was little I could do.

It appears Mort Bernstein never registered the sale of the FPL property to me, and that was the reason I never received a tax bill. Mort had pocketed $18,00.00

Before it was all over, I had to buy back the FPL easement for $10,000.00 plus attorney’s fees.

Then everything went smoothly until 2005, when fuel prices went way up.

Jerry’s business depended on people having cheap fuel and lots of disposable income, so their business also went downhill.

Then Jerry passed away and his son Ed said they were closing.

We put a “For Rent” sign up and a business that fixed up and repaired emergency vehicles quickly rented the building.

However, after several months they stopped paying the rent, and we found out the company was owned by a very wealthy Venezuelan family.

Dealing with them was quite a situation. When we spoke to the mother about the rent she acted as if she didn’t have to pay rent. It was like we were imposing on her.

Eventually with assistance of our attorney, we got them to leave.

As we were cleaning out the building, we were approached by a very jovial Puerto Rican fellow named Torres.

Torres said he was in the repossession business

So, we now rented the building to Torres “The Repo Man”.

We checked him out and Torres did own a repossession company that claimed to have offices in Orlando Florida as well as Key West.

Torres was a funny guy that we always enjoyed talking to. He called me whiskers.

He once told us, “I employ only drug addicts as my employees, because they know where people hide their cars that we have to repossess.”

In 2010, Torres stopped paying rent.

We got our attorney Steven Tunstall involved, and after the 3rd court appearance, Mr. Torres’s attorney stopped showing up and the “Repo Man” was finally evicted.

When Torres finally left the building, he left behind tons of trash.

It appeared to us that whenever they repossessed a car they removed and kept everything that was in the car, while they looked for hidden drugs.

They had so much stuff they removed from cars it required a 40-foot dumpster to hold the junk he left behind.

So, while we were in the process of cleaning the mess that Torres had left us. We put in the window a small “For Rent” sign.

Lots of people started coming by, inquiring about the building.

It appears that by 2010 all the land in Hialeah Gardens had already been sold and my little 30 foot by 60 foot building, was now lost in a cavern of monster warehouses.

In February of 2011 we rented the building to a fellow named Pastor Iva.

Pastor has an automotive fleet maintenance company, and he has fixed up and painted the building beautifully, to suit his business.

I think you will agree that the little 30 foot by 60-foot building has had quite a history in only a few years.

And to think that once upon a time it was the only building that you could see in Hialeah Gardens, try finding it now.

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