By Myrna Trauntvein
Times-News Correspondent
Juab County Commissioners, in an effort to make a
decision on what should be done with the old, unused county
hospital building, spent the morning listening to the ideas
of several real estate agents.
Wallace Ballow, representing Century 21 Bushnell;
Barbara Painter, Bruce Tucker, Sarah Robinson, and Katy
Jackson, representing Prudential Utah Real Estate; and David
Harmon, Century 21 Harmon all met in individual groups with
commissioners to discuss what could be done to market the
old building.
"We are still in the preliminary stages of making a
decision," said Robert Steele, commissioner. "We are
interested in your ideas but we don't know whether it would
be better to sell the building or to tear it down and sell
the property."
In his estimation, said Harmon, the property alone was
of much less value than the property with a building still
on it.
"Many same-size retail buildings sell for a few
hundred thousand dollars," said Harmon. "The property,
without the building, would have a value as residential
building lots of only $130,000."
"Therefore, in my opinion, it would be better to sell
the property with a building on it."
Katy Jackson said the property could serve as a rest
home, care facility, or rehabilitation facility.
Her team, she said, would do a statistical analysis to
determine which would be the best and did have all the tools
necessary to find a buyer for the building.
All the agents agreed that finding a buyer would
depend, in large part, on what zoning uses would allow and,
in addition, what uses the city and county would agree would
be good for the community.
For example, commissioners do not favor a facility for
wayward youth, drug rehabilitation, delinquent
rehabilitation, or anything of that nature because the old
hospital is located near schools, churches and residential
areas.
"On-the-other-hand, many of our young people transfer
away from Nephi and Juab County to places where there are
more jobs," said Wm. Boyd Howarth, commissioner. "We would
like some potential business to locate in the building that
would provide good quality jobs for our citizens."
Wallace Ballow said the internet now takes potential
properties of the nature of the old hospital and makes them
available to buyers all over the world.
In fact, his agency offered to take the lowest
percentage by one percent, to sell the hospital.
"We take a percentage of the sale price of the
building after the sale is completed," said Ballow.
That was a general point, and all the agents agreed
that the work of matching a buyer to the building would be
done and when, and if, the building sold and then they would
take their percentage from the sale price.
"We still need to discuss the property and we still
have things we need to determine, for one thing, we need to
find out what uses the city will allow and if we need to
change the zone to offer the property for some kinds of
buyers," said Steele.
"The roof leaks in a few places," said Barbara
Painter. "We wondered if the repair would be done before the
sale."
That could happen, said Howarth.
"We are keeping the daycare portion of the building,"
said Howarth. "That will not be for sale with the other
property."
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