Developer Vatche Manoukian has purchased scores of properties in Greater Nashua in the last 25 years, but none that captured public attention quite like the St. Francis Xavier Church.
Manoukian bought the landmark church for $1 million in 2006 from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Manchester with plans to donate the building to his own faith, the Armenian Orthodox Church.
The 100-year-old building, built by French immigrants and revered for its grand Norman basilica architecture, had been vacant since 2003, when the Catholic Church closed it, citing a dwindling attendance, low tithing and the nationwide clergy shortage.
Complex negotiations with the Armenian church eventually broke down, so Manoukian arranged to sell the church to another ancient Christian sect, the Coptic Orthodox Church, which is holding services there now. The deal finally put to rest years of concern that the church would be demolished or converted for commercial use.
“The ending was good,” Manoukian said. “It went to a faith that are using it as a church. No developer came to tear it down.”
Behind the scenes, however, not everyone is happy with the ending.
A private investor who loaned Manoukian $1 million to pay off his mortgage to the Catholic Church and fix up the property claims he lost $300,000 on the deal.
Scott Schoenig, an investor who lives in New Jersey, claims Manoukian stopped making his loan payments after about one year in August 2008 and then arranged a “short sale” of the property to the Copts without his permission. Schoenig said he had no choice but to accept a sale of the property for less than Manoukian owed, fearing he would never see any money otherwise.
“The whole transaction was very unethical,” Schoenig said.
Not only did he take a substantial loss, Schoenig said last week in a telephone interview, but he also paid the tax liens that had accrued on the property and Manoukian’s legal fees. He contacted the paper after learning that Manoukian is asking the city for zoning variances to start a new project.
“The guy’s obviously not a developer that the city should be working with,” Schoenig said. “. . . To even have the nerve to go in front of the Planning Board again for approval, it’s incredible.”
Manoukian acknowledged that Schoenig loaned him money to finance renovations to the church rectory, which he had originally planned to convert into apartments. But he denies that Schoenig lost any money on the deal or paid the tax liens on the property.
The loan was facilitated by a Meredith-based company called Financial Resources, which arranges construction loans from private investors. Schoenig claims the company knows he lost money on the deal, yet is still floating new Manoukian projects to investors without disclosing those details.
According to Manoukian, negotiations with the Armenian Orthodox Church broke down because there were “too many cooks in the kitchen.” Despite the fact that it was a donation, the Armenians had to adhere to strict policies in order to accept the church as a gift, he said.
Manoukian and his lawyer, Andrew Prolman, said it became difficult to negotiate back and forth with Armenian church leaders in Jerusalem and New York City.
“Everyone was kind of pecking at each other,” Manoukian said. “As all that was happening, Coptics came into the picture.”
Although the Copts paid $800,000 for the church, Manoukian considers it a donation. That $800,000 paid for improvements he made to the rectory, he said.
Schoenig, however, questions whether Manoukian put even close to that amount into the rectory, which was never converted into apartments.
