Saying business at his Hollister Honda dealership
”
has been almost non-existent over the past couple of years,
”
Marty Greenwood recently requested and was granted a second,
two-year extension on repayment to the Redevelopment Agency of $1.9
million in loans on the 22,000-square-foot business at the city’s
northern entrance.
Saying business at his Hollister Honda dealership “has been almost non-existent over the past couple of years,” Marty Greenwood recently requested and was granted a second, two-year extension on repayment to the Redevelopment Agency of $1.9 million in loans on the 22,000-square-foot business at the city’s northern entrance.
The extension, granted last week by the Hollister City Council in its role as the RDA’s board, comes on the heels of a two-year extension that has allowed the dealership to postpone repaying the loans that were used to renovate the former Good Times Bowl at 411 San Felipe Road into a motorcycle dealership.
In his letter seeking more time to begin what city officials estimate will be monthly repayment terms at or above $10,000 for 20 years, Greenwood said, “we have taken a beating, to be completely honest with you.”
“We strive diligently to keep the local citizens employed by our company,” he wrote, noting that he has nine full-time and three part-time employees at the store. “Unfortunately, there has not been enough business for us to make a profit. We continue to search for innovative ways to reach outside of our four walls here in Hollister to grow our business to become a profitable one but (it) has not happened as of yet.”
Greenwood said the store needs to sell 50 to 60 units per month to turn a profit, but it is instead averaging half that.
“We have lost hundreds of thousands (of) dollars in this venture thus far and we are taking every step to survive these difficult economic times,” he said. “At this time it would be catastrophic to our business if we incur any more expenses.”
Hollister Development Services Director William Avera said the RDA board approved a second extension after it “realized that nothing much has turned around a lot” in the past two years.
Despite its struggles, Hollister Honda has consistently ranked among the top 10 sales tax generators in the city, according to Avera.
“They do generate a sizeable amount of sales tax for the city and they’re still contributing quite a bit to the city with jobs and sales,” he said. “They are also expanding their business to sales over the Internet.”
Asked if the city’s loans to Greenwood, his brother, Mike, and their partner Dave Galtman, are as appealing in hindsight as they were five years ago, Avera noted that the business is doing “as well or better than” other such dealerships around the state.
“Not only was it a good idea to have Honda here as a business, but more importantly the city was getting rid of a vacant, blighted building at the entrance to our community,” he said. “The rehab the building went through was pretty extensive. They took an old bowling alley and reconstructed it to new building codes. The Honda part of it was a bonus. If something were to happen to the business itself, we still did a good job of rehabbing the building.”
If after the two-year loan repayment extension Greenwood and his partners are unable to repay the loan, they could ask for yet another extension from the RDA or the agency could foreclose on the property, according to Avera. Santa Barbara Bank holds the primary mortgage on the property, with the RDA in a second position.
