Auctioneer Mike Adams (with clipboard) makes a note after receiving zero bids for the Bayshore Mall parcels. | Ryan Burns.

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PREVIOUSLY

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A crowd of close to 30 people gathered on the courthouse steps this morning in hopes of being among the first to learn the fate of the beleaguered and debt-laden Bayshore Mall, but the scheduled foreclosure auction proved anticlimactic.

“Do I have any bidders here?” called out auctioneer Mike Adams, an unassuming man with slicked back white hair and baggy clothes. He’d been hired by a company called Superior Default Services to handle today’s proceedings, and he’d already asked around to see if there were any certified bidders.

There weren’t. One man had shown up with a check made out to himself, but that’s not allowed. Checks needed to be made out to the beneficiary, which, in this case, is a company called Assured Lender Services. 

Adams proceeded to read off a description of the property for sale: eight parcels and part of a ninth located at 3300 and 3450 Broadway Street. This includes the entirety of the Bayshore Mall except for the current Kohl’s location. The old Sears and current Walmart buildings are part of the deal, as is the nearby McDonald’s, most of the mall’s parking lots and some adjacent greenbelt land.

There is $38,945,221.94 in debt attached to these parcels, but the trustee had instructed Adams to open the bidding at $12 million even. If anyone had bid that amount, he was instructed to keep raising the asking price in $250,000 increments until bidding reached or exceeded $16.8 million, after which the highest bidder would have become the new owner.

The Humboldt County government has shown interest in the old Sears building at the north end of the mall, and the Board of Supervisors recently authorized staff to negotiate a deal for that parcel, which the county would convert into a one-stop permitting center. But no one from the county was present this morning. 

Nor were there any representatives from Home Depot. Eureka City Manager Miles Slattery recently revealed to the Outpost that the big box retailer has been searching for a spot in Eureka for more than a year and is specifically interested in that same Sears spot. 

“How much am I offered and by whom?” Adams asked the assembled group. “How much am I offered and by whom? How much am I offered and by whom?” Looking down at his clipboard, he declared, “The property reverted at 10:02.”

With no bids, the parcels reverted back to the current owner, a Delaware corporation called Bay Shore Mall, LP Assured Lender Services, Inc., the beneficiary of the deed of trust. [CORRECTION: Bay Shore Mall, LP, was the trustee held in default.]

We reached out to the county to ask whether staff will pursue a purchase of the Sears building directly with the owner. We’ll update this post if and when we get a reply.

As the crowd milled about and murmured among themselves on the courthouse steps, one woman approached Adams.

“Did the mall get sold?” she asked.

“It reverted,” he said. “It reverted back to the beneficiary.”

Her face was blank.

“Nobody bought it,” Adams clarified.

“So what happens now,” a nearby man asked.

“It’s in their hands,” Adams answered. “I don’t know.”

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CORRECTION, 3 p.m.: This post initially misidentified the party to whom the deed of trust reverted. The Outpost regrets the error.