Los Gatos Weekly-Times

Photograph by George Sakkestad

Lysbet Wright was photographed in front of her Queen Anne Victorian home shortly after Willie and Helen Cadiente bought the house just as it was to go on the auction block.

'Saviors' battle over Victorian home

By Clarence Cromwell

After the Loma Prieta earthquake damaged Kay Taylor's Victorian house at 55 Hernandez Ave., generous rescuers twice stepped in to help Taylor and her daughter, Lysbet Wright, when it seemed they would lose their stately 5,000-square-foot house on a hill above the Almond Grove District.

Now, Taylor and Wright have died and the benefactors who helped repair the house are fighting over ownership of it. Contractor Tim Lantz filed a lawsuit against the house's new owners, Willie and Helen Cadiente, alleging that Taylor was supposed to leave the house to Lantz in her will. The Cadientes, who own the nursing home where Taylor stayed briefly before she died, bought the house from Wright an hour before the state was to put it on the auction block because of unpaid loans from the California Disaster Assistance Program. They say they knew nothing about the deal with Lantz.

The story starts just after 5 p.m. on Oct. 17, 1989. The quake that shook up the Bay Area that afternoon partially collapsed the house that Taylor and her daughter lived in at the time.

Taylor couldn't afford to repair the historic house, so the state stepped in with a $400,000 loan and the town of Los Gatos loaned $10,000. Taylor also borrowed $60,000 from American Savings and Loan.

Still, when Lantz rebuilt the house at a cost of $780,000, Taylor had to promise to draw up a will leaving the house to Lantz. Their contract for the repairs stipulated that Lantz would gain sole ownership of the house, Lantz's complaint reveals, but Wright would be allowed to live in the house the rest of her life.

The deal fell apart because Taylor died--without writing a will--in 1993. After her death, the state called for full payment of the emergency loans; it would not accept installments from Wright.

Wright sold the house to the Cadientes an hour before the foreclosure and auction of the house. She had asked $1 million for the house. The Cadientes paid $800,000.

Wright actually received $500,000 in the form of a one-time payment. The other $300,000 came in the form of permission for the 64-year-old Wright to spend the rest of her life in the house.

The Cadientes calculated that the $300,000 would cover at least 17 years: $30,000 a year for the first five years and $11,666 per year for a dozen more years.

But Wright died in the middle of June, two years after signing the contract. A month before Wright's death, Lantz filed a suit against her as the executor of Taylor's will, and against the Cadientes.

Lantz alleges that he's still owed at least $275,000 for the work that he did. He has received a $475,000 payment to date.

Lantz seeks a $275,000 lien on the house.

In a response to Lantz's complaint, the Cadientes declare that they did not know about his deal with Taylor and that Lantz should have recovered his fees from Taylor's estate when she died.

Attorneys for Lantz and the Cadientes would not comment on the case. The case is expected to go to arbitration in November.

[ Back to Contents Page | Los Gatos Weekly-Times Home Page | Archives ]