Max Farash, real estate mogul, dies

Real estate mogul Max Farash, 95, dies
Steve Orr/Mary Chao
March 1, 2010
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20100301/NEWS01/3010335/Real-estate-mogul-Max-Farash–95–dies
Max M. Farash, who rose from humble immigrant beginnings to become one of the Rochester area’s wealthiest and most successful business owners, died early Sunday morning at the age of 95.

Mr. Farash, who built a real estate empire once estimated to be worth $500 million and was a generous supporter of charitable causes, died at a Webster nursing home where he had spent the last six years of his life. He had been in declining health for years and his daughter, Lynn Farash, said Sunday night he had suffered from Alzheimer’s disease.

Mr. Farash and his company, Farash Corp., owned and managed 5,000 apartment and townhouse units in the Rochester region and Florida, as well as commercial property and vacant land throughout the area.

He was a “very good business man and a kind person,” said Matthew Aroesty, Mr. Farash’s grandnephew and a former chief executive of Farash Corp.

Lynn Farash, who was the only child of Mr. Farash and his late wife, Marian M. Farash, who died in July 2007, remembered him as a loving father who was always home for dinner and always there for her bedtime ritual, which involved reading poems.

“Considering all that he had on his plate, he always had time for me,” Lynn Farash said.

Under the terms of his will, most of Mr. Farash’s fortune is to pass to the Max and Marian Farash Charitable Foundation. Depending on the revenue derived from sale of his real estate and other assets, the foundation could wind up with the largest endowment of any foundation in the region.

Larry Glazer, CEO of Buckingham Properties, said Mr. Farash was well-respected in the business community but will be best remembered for the  foundation.

“It’s huge,” Glazer said. “It’s going to make a major impact for the community, Jewish and non-Jewish.”

At one time a potent business leader and a behind-the-scenes player in local Republican politics, Mr. Farash withdrew from active participation in his company at least a half-dozen years ago, and he was declared mentally incapacitated by a state Supreme Court judge in February 2007, about 3½ years after he left his Brighton estate for the Webster nursing home.

Since that time, his daughter served as his personal guardian, but his business affairs were overseen by a court-appointed property guardian, lawyer James C. Gocker.

Gocker, who has had largely unfettered control over Mr. Farash’s assets, has restructured his property holdings, created several large trusts, brought about two changes in management at Farash Corp. and revamped operation of the family foundation.

He could not be reached for comment Sunday night.

Mr. Farash’s death will focus even more attention on Gocker, who has been paid more than $1 million for his guardian work and has clashed repeatedly with Lynn Farash and Aroesty. Lawsuits are pending against Lynn Farash and Aroesty seeking repayment of millions of dollars that Gocker says was misappropriated, and evidence presented by the guardian led to criminal charges against Aroesty that also are pending.

Gocker is trustee of one or more family trusts, meaning he will continue to be involved in Mr. Farash’s finances.

Mr. Farash, the youngest of eight children, emigrated as a young boy from Monastir, a war-torn city in what now is Macedonia. His father died when Max was very young, and he was raised by his mother in northeast Rochester among a large extended family. Mr. Farash was an entrepreneur while in Franklin High School, selling pistachios and other snacks in vending machines. He was in the heating and cooling business before founding Farash Corp. in 1959.

Initially, the company built single family homes in Irondequoit and Rochester and before developing apartment complexes, growing along with the growth of Rochester companies such as Xerox Corp. and Eastman Kodak Co.

Mr. Farash, who loved to ride horses and had stables in Mendon, taught his daughter and granddaughters Barie Fox, 32 and Katie Tarbox, 28, how to ride.

“He was a very loving grandfather,” said Tarbox, a competitive ballroom dancer in New York City, recalling how she and her sister would ride with him every weekend when they were young. “He taught me about responsibility.”

Fox, of Pittsford, said Sunday night of her grandfather: “I loved him very much and he’ll be very much missed.”

Lawrence Fine, executive director of the Jewish Community Federation, said Mr. Farash was “a very generous philanthropist to the Jewish community, and had been a very, very generous contributor to the federation for at least 30 years.”

Includes reporting by staff writer Nestor Ramos.