A block off Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis sits a long-vacant home with peeling paint and storm windows that tumbled into the shrubs below. The main floor is gutted, plants are overgrown and pigeons were the most recent inhabitants.
And it is not just the dilapidated home on Irving Avenue S. that has neighbors grousing, but also the owner — Ross Fefercorn, a developer of multimillion-dollar commercial and residential projects.
"People get annoyed with Ross because he's buildings things elsewhere," neighbor Jean Bass said. "It would be different if he was destitute."
Fefercorn has owned the duplex for 16 years, but it has been empty about a decade, a scruffy blight in a neighborhood known for lush green yards and some of the city's most expensive homes.
The city added Fefercorn's property to the vacant building list in 2007, the only such property in the East Isles neighborhood. The annual penalty doubles his property tax bill, to almost $17,000 a year.
Frustration over the duplex erupted at the East Isles Residents Association board meeting two years ago, with some neighbors suggesting the city not approve any more development deals for Fefercorn until the Irving property is fixed up. Some note his personal home blocks away in the Wedge neighborhood is well-kept with pleasant landscaping.
"I do things slowly, but when I do them, I do a pretty good job," he said.
Fefercorn said he bought the duplex with the idea he might live there someday. He rented it to tenants for a few years, but then began to gut it. He said he ran into unforeseen structural issues that arose from the house being cobbled together on different foundations over its 106-year history. Those problems, and then the housing recession, stalled progress. He said he is now debating whether to sell, rehabilitate or tear down the duplex and build a new home. The city said Fefercorn took steps toward demolishing the building in 2009 but never followed through.
