Mansion above the bay
A massive mansion atop a hill in a Lower Hutt seaside suburb built for the managing director of failed Ebert Construction may be the last project the company ever completes.
Kelvin Hale, managing director of the construction company now in liquidation, has been keeping a low profile but has continued to beautify his home since the company’s collapse.
A winding driveway leads to the massive secluded three-storey house on a bush-clad hillside, with a six-car garage and walls of glass overlooking Wellington Harbour.
Construction began in 2015, and earthworks along the property’s driveway were continuing this week. A digger can be seen near an area where resource consent was granted for the previous owners to build a swimming pool.
Ebert Construction was contracted to work on the home by Hale’s family trust.
The property had a combined rateable value of $5.9 million in September 2016 but a billboard put up by family of a subcontractor owed $700,000 by Ebert Construction alleged the property was worth $10m.
The company’s first liquidation report found the company was involved in 15 projects at the time of its collapse, and owed creditors more than $45m.
Subcontractors were owed $33.84m, including $9.3m in retentions – money that is held back from subcontractors to guarantee any below-par work is remedied.
Absent from those mentioned was the contract for Hale’s home in Lowry Bay, which he is understood to have moved into within weeks of the company’s collapse.
Ebert Construction’s invoices for the property were paid in full, according to the lawyer for the family trust.
Hale changed his address with the Company’s Office to the Lowry Bay address a few days after the company was tipped into receivership.
When approached by Stuff this week, Hale refused to comment.
Commercial lawyer Geoff Hardy, who specialises in construction company liquidations, said under changes to the Construction Contracts Act, construction companies were required to hold retentions in trust for subcontractors.
This makes it so receivers and liquidators cannot use those funds to pay secured creditors such as Hale, who lent the company $3.5m before its collapse.
For some of Ebert’s subcontractors, the law change came too late, and because they signed contracts with the company before March 31 last year, the company was not legally required to hold their retentions in trust.