A businessman who angered local residents by acquiring several properties in a small California coastal town has responded to claims that he is just cashing in.
Jeff Hansen, 64, moved to Point Arena, a town of just 451 people, from Utah in 2014 after falling in love with the beautiful landscape.
But over the years, his real estate investments have led to heated disputes with tenants, business partners and neighbors.
However, speaking exclusively to DailyMail.com, Hansen claimed that “the place was spinning in the toilet” before he started buying properties.
“I saw potential in the buildings and old motels I’m fixing up,” he continued.
Half the city likes me. The other half hates my guts with a militant touch, you know? And they are the noisy ones.
Hansen further angered some local residents with his appointment to the city council in December 2022, giving him the power to vote on resolutions that could directly affect his real estate portfolio.
However, Mayor Barbara Burkey assured residents two years ago that she would recuse herself from any decisions about their properties, and she pledged to do so as well.
Meanwhile, City Manager Peggy Ducey said she is aware that Hansen is a “controversial figure” but said the city cannot infringe on his rights to purchase property.
Jeff Hansen (pictured) has become one of Point Arena’s most prolific real estate investors.
A drone photo showing almost all of Point Arena, a town of 451 people.
In addition to running a motel, Hansen also owns several businesses and ran a restaurant, owned by his son, for a few months.
However, Hansen was criticized by locals last week in an article published by The Chronicle of San Francisco.
The article claims she forced a business to close and featured accounts from a former business partner and a tenant who claims they suffered retaliation against her.
Hansen told DailyMail.com that through his LLCs, which are connected to close and distant relatives, he personally owns 12 addresses throughout the 1.4-square-mile city.
Six of them are residential properties, totaling 11 units.
Two of its apartments are above the city’s defunct general store on Main Street and three other apartments are in a building on nearby Center Street.
The remaining four units are two duplexes on Mill Street.
“Five years ago I bought two duplexes and a five-plex, anticipating the need for employee housing,” Hansen explained.
He said that because Point Arena is so small, it makes it a “difficult place to work and do business.”
Because of that, he said, “it became apparent” that he would have to buy rental housing for employees and future employees whenever they came up for sale.
He believes this strategy will make his businesses viable.
He said two of his employees live in his current apartments, while the rest of his tenants do not work for him.
His two employees pay rent, although they do not have to live in their apartments as a condition of their employment, he said.
Pictured: All Point Arena properties owned by Hansen and her two children, a son and daughter.
Pictured: A street-level view of Main Street in Point Arena. The busiest stretch of road, which features shops, restaurants and a movie theater, is less than a quarter mile long.
His most notable purchase was the former Seashell Inn on Main Street, which for years had been an eyesore hosting loud late-night parties, according to local outlet The Ukiah Diary.
In late 2014, Hansen purchased the two lots on either side of Main Street where the two “abandoned” hotel buildings stood. As part of that $1 million purchase, he also purchased a lot that contained an abandoned gas station next door.
In 2020, he reopened the building on the west side of the street and renamed it Wildflower Boutique Motel, with new solar panels, custom furniture and floral details.
It is still in the midst of renovating the building on the east side and will have a total of 40 accommodation rooms when completed.
“I just got a coastal development permit to build the parking lot across the street, which I waited two years for,” he said. “The building regulations here on the coast are very draconian.”
Next door to the Wildflower Motel, he owns a building that has a Japanese izakaya restaurant on the ground floor and a manager’s room on the second floor.
He also owns two former fraternal organization meeting rooms.
Pictured: The Wildflower Motel, which Hansen purchased in 2014 and opened in 2020 to great success.
Pictured: An aerial view of Point Arena’s main street. The Wildflower Motel can be seen in the lower left corner with solar panels on the roof.
Two doors down from the Wildflower Motel, he owns a building that used to be run by the Ancient Order of Druids in America, a nonprofit religious organization founded in 1912.
Hansen currently rents it to a fishing company that he said prepares fish in the building’s commercial kitchen.
On Mill Street, he owns a still-boarded-up building that was formerly owned by the Odd Fellows, another fraternal sorority founded in 1819.
In addition to his portfolio, his two adult children also own property in Point Arena.
Hansen’s daughter purchased a former marijuana dispensary on Main Street after it had been on the market for a year.
His son also owns two buildings on Main Street. One of them has three commercial tenants, including an art studio, an apothecary and a thrift store.
The other building his son owns is two doors up and was the site of Amber’s Diner, a restaurant that closed last year after a dispute between Hansen and a business partner.
Hansen downplayed his family’s influence on Point Arena by saying his purchases have been made gradually over the past 10 years, while claiming that not many people wanted the properties he bought.
A former tenant of one of his Mill Street units, whom The Chronicle only identified as Olivia, said Hansen cut down a plum tree in the yard of his rental home in 2020.
He denied this and said the plum tree is still on that property to this day.
A recent article in a local newspaper called the Independent Coast Observer focused on The Chronicle’s reporting and included an image of the plum tree.
Pictured: The plum tree that Olivia claimed Hansen cut down in 2020
Hansen denied or contradicted many of the anecdotes presented in The Chronicle article (Pictured: Point Arena city limits)
Hansen explained that he never cut the tree completely. He said he trims the building’s tree once a year to maintain its fire insurance.
“At the end of the day, a building owner has the right to maintain his yard as he sees fit,” he said.
Olivia also claimed that Hansen retaliated against her for raising the objection about the plum tree by increasing her rent twice, each time by 10 percent, the maximum annual increase allowed by California.
Hansen provided leasing documents to DailyMail.com that showed he increased Olivia’s rent in 2019 by 10 percent to $1,045 per month. It increased it again by just over 8 percent in 2020.
He said these rent increases were introduced for all of his tenants and clarified that Olivia was not selected.
The documents also showed that Olivia was given a goodwill rent concession of $340 from September to December 2020, meaning she was only expected to pay the previous year’s rent of $1,045 a month.
Olivia did not sign the new lease and moved out by Jan. 31, 2021, according to the documents.
In February 2024, Michael Schnekenburger criticized Hansen on Facebook for allegedly forcing Amber’s Diner to close.
Hansen and Schnekenburger were business partners in the restaurant, but Hansen was also the owner. Hansen’s son is the registered owner of the building.
The restaurant opened in July 2023 and closed four months later.
The Point Arena Lighthouse at sunset. It is one of the most sustainable tourist destinations in the small city of only 451 inhabitants.
“We closed because of Jeff,” Schnekenburger wrote on Facebook. ‘Dictating schedules, imposing certain conditions on us, bad decisions and business practices. That was the whole reason.
Hansen had a different version of events, stating that he closed the restaurant because it was losing thousands of dollars per week.
He told DailyMail.com he had “every right” to discontinue a business that was not profitable.
Hansen also revealed that his son’s girlfriend was in the process of opening a new restaurant in the space where Amber’s used to be. He just got approved for a liquor license, he said.
When asked if he wants to own more real estate in Point Arena even though he is a city councilman with input into community development, Hansen said “it’s not illegal for me to own property.”
He added that he has only purchased one building, Odd Fellows Hall, since he has been a member of the city council.
When asked about purchasing more properties in Point Arena in the future, Hansen kept the door open, saying that if someone offered him a building that made sense, he would “consider it.”