Next witness, please.

MR. PANOSH: Mr. Routh, please.

THOMAS S. ROUTH, being first duly sworn, testified as follows during DIRECT EXAMINATION by MR. PANOSH:

Q    Would you state your name, sir.

A    Thomas S. Routh.

Q    And Mr. Routh, where are you employed?

A    Robins & Weill, Inc.

Q    And what is Robins and Weill, Incorporated?

A    It is a Greensboro-based insurance agency and real estate brokerage firm.

Q    And for the court reporter, that's spelled R-o-b-i-n-s and W-e-i-l-l; is that correct?

A    That's correct.

Q    In the course of your duties, did you handle the property that was -- on which Lyles Building Supply was situated on West Lee Street?

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A    I did. I do.

Q    Who was the owner of that property?

A    Glascock Stove and Manufacturing Company. That is a company owned by the family of Thomas A. Glascock here in Greensboro.

Q    And did there come a time when you reached an agreement with Mr. Gary Lyles for a long-term lease on that property?

A    Yes, I did. In April of 1981, we arranged a 10-year lease with Lyles Building and Salvage, that Gary Lyles was the principal on. So it was a 10-year lease, beginning April 1, 1981.

Q    And was that lease extended from time to time?

A    It was. Mr. Lyles always was concerned that he not get too near the end of the term, because of the length of time it would take to relocate the business. So some two and a half years before the end of that 10-year term, he asked to renegotiate and extend the lease, and that was done. And a similar action was taken a couple years later.

Q    Drawing your attention then to the early part of 1994, spring of 1994, what was the status of the lease at the time that the business changed hands from Mr. Lyles to Mr. Kimble?

A    Mr. Lyles had by that time extended the lease, so that it would run through March 31 of 1997. We were notified in March of 1994 that Ted Kimble, who had been an employee of

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Mr. Lyles, was buying the company. It would not change the tenant, it would not change the entity that we were leasing to, but the ownership of Lyles Building and Salvage would be changing from Mr. Lyles to Mr. Kimble. And we received that notification March of 1994.

Q    And therefore, the lease remained in effect?

A    It did. It was unaffected.

Q    On or about November of 1994, did you and Ted Kimble discuss the sale of the property from Glascock to Mr. Ted Kimble?

A    At about that time frame, that fall of 1994, Mr. Kimble did talk to me toward assuring that he would be able to continue to operate in that location. He asked that we either make an extension of the lease of some term, or would we consider selling the property. We had those discussions.

Q    And in the course of those discussions, was there a price suggested or talked about?

A    Not that I recall. We -- the ownership, the Glascock ownership, never has -- never had, never has expressed a desire to sell the property. There was no discussion of a suggestion of what an acceptable price would be. To the extent we -- there was a conversation initiated by Mr. Kimble that, would we sell the property. We very well may have indicated, based on rental values, a value for -- as a sales price maybe in a certain range. But I have searched

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my file, I have no records that we ever stated a price. I have no reason to believe we did.

Q    And what would that range of sale price have been?

A    Based on the rental at that time, it would have suggested a price somewhere in the 180 to 200 thousand dollars.

MR. PANOSH: No further questions. Thank you, sir.

MR. LLOYD: No questions, Your Honor.

THE COURT: Step down, sir.

(The witness left the witness stand.)