An $8 Million Montecito Mansion With Presidential Pedigree

“I’m probably the poorest person that’s ever lived here,” said Howard Rochestie of his 6,630-square-foot Montecito, Calif., home. “And we’re definitely the first family to live here full-time.”

Built in 1938 by the prominent area architect G. Lawrence Stimson, the art deco-style house was used by a wealthy Pasadena family as a vacation home for more than 40 years, then was purchased by Robert Floyd, whose company, Fitz & Floyd, provided 215 gold-rimmed place settings for the Reagan White House. Next, the home was conferred with a different kind of presidential pedigree when it was purchased by Liu Ting, whose father, Liu Shaoqi, was the president of the People’s Republic of China from 1959 until 1968. (By the end of his presidency, he'd clashed with Mao and was imprisoned; Liu died in 1969.)