Photos: A vacant spec mansion
The living room and foyer of the 16,500-square-foot home in Coto de Caza in Orange County. It was put up for auction and received a high bid of $6.6 million -- less than what the seller was willing to accept. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
A vanity cabinet, from Indonesia, in the bathroom of the master guest room. The estate has eight bedrooms and the master bedroom suite alone is 3,200 square feet. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
Larry Igarashi, in the family room of his “Santa Barbara ranch,” went all-out to build the hilltop house. He had expected it to sell for $10 million. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
The 3,250-square-foot bedroom. The house also features a 10-car, climate-controlled garage at 4,000 square feet. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
Advertisement
Igarashi had been building spec homes as a kind of working hobby since 1980, but he acknowledges that he miscalculated the market. “I just didn’t expect this would happen,” he said of the housing crash. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
The hilltop mansion is just one of dozens of unsold mega-mansions across Southern California conceived during the real estate bubble. Its price is under negotiation. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)