sold and resold the same 3,700-square-foot house at 7865 Cove Terrace in Sarasota four times.

Multiple investments, serial defaults | HeraldTribune.comPage 3 of 5

In a later set of deals from December 1999 to February 2004, Adams and four other investors -- three of whom had participated in other deals with Adams over the years -- sold and resold the same 3,700-square-foot house at 7865 Cove Terrace in Sarasota four times.

In this case, it was Adams' long-time business associate Steven Wexler, a Sarasota real estate investor and president of Waterside Property Sales, who started the chain reaction. Wexler bought the house in December 1999 for $600,000 and financed the purchase with a $544,000 loan from BankUnited.

Wexler sold the house a month later to John Keyworth, for $725,000 and Keyworth got $728,750 in loans from BankUnited and First Union.

In March of 2001, Keyworth, who participated in another real estate deal with Adams at that time, sold the property to Adams for $1 million and Adams received $1.275 million in loans from Chevy Chase Bank and US Funding Group.

Adams resold the house in August of the same year to John West for $1.475 million, and West got $1.38 million in loans from Chevy Chase and US Funding.

West finally sold the property in March 2004 to another long-time Adams business associate, Charles Scott Abel, for $1.95 million and Abel received a $1.5 million loan from Washington Mutual.

In May 2007, Washington Mutual foreclosed on Abel's loans and seized the house after winning a $2.088 million judgment.

Wexler, Keyworth and West did not return calls seeking comment about the transfers, and efforts to find a telephone number for Abel were unsuccessful.

In another deal that involved sales to and from associates, Abel bought a condominium unit at 6140 Midnight Pass Road on Siesta Key for $380,000 in June 2001 and financed the deal with $380,000 in loans from Bank of America. Abel sold the condo to Adams in April 2002 for $425,000 and Adams received $390,000 in loans from Impac Funding and AmSouth Bank.

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