More than 1,000 bid farewell to Southern California real estate icon Bruce Mulhearn
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With bagpipe music playing softly in the background, more than 1,000 admirers rose to their feet and sang “Auld Lang Syne” to bid a final farewell Saturday, Jan. 12, to real estate legend Bruce Mulhearn who died last month at 80.
It was an emotional Celebration of Life at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in downtown Long Beach for Mulhearn who was a dominant figure in the Southern California real estate industry for half a century.
Many in the audience brushed away tears as they sang the words written by Scottish poet Robert Burns in the l8th century: “For auld lang syne (for old times sake), we’ll take a cup of kindness yet, for auld lang syne.” Leading the singing from the podium was Mulhearn’s wife of 58 years, Tomazina, and their son, Kirk, and daughter, Elaine.
“This was a beautiful tribute for a man who led a wonderful life and left us a wonderful legacy,” Tomazina said to prolonged applause from the audience, including Mulhearn’s 98-year-old mother, Aline, who lives in Leisure World in Seal Beach.
Mulhearn was remembered as an industry innovator and a super salesman who took a 600-square-foot office he started in Bellflower 52 years with one salesman – himself-and a part-time secretary (his wife) and built it into Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties, one of the top real estate brokerages in the nation with more than 800 sales associates.
“Since Bruce passed, I have never seen such a greater depth of respect and love for him from all corners of California and the United States,” said Gino Blefari, president and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices in Irvine. “There will never be another like him.”
A military honor guard presented an American flag to Mulhearn’s wife while Taps was played. Mulhearn spent two years in the U.S. Army.
Music provided by the James Bangar Big Band gave an uplifting spirit to the celebration. The band played “Alfie,” Mulhearn’s favorite song about a Cockney man searching for love. In fact, Mulhearn’s latest book, “What’s It All About?” took its title from the first line in the song. Mulhearn’s book answers the question with “It’s About People!”
Later in the program, a melodic song extolling “Scotland the brave” was played with the audience clapping their hands in time to the music. “Whoo, hoo!” shouted several people as the song ended with the highland mountains of Scotland on the screens.
Tim Rush, Mulhearn’s longtime friend and senior vice president of Berkshire Hathaway Home Services California Properties, described Mulhearn’s life from selling bleach door-to-door as an 8-year-old boy growing up in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne in northern England and eventually settling in Southern California and starting out in the real estate business.
“It’s a long way from Newcastle on the border near Scotland to Southern California, but Bruce made the journey, and he worked day and night to become a huge success,” Rush said.
Rush also told how Mulhearn’s strong competitive spirit and business creativity helped him to not only survive but thrive through five major economic downturns and a firebombing of his office in Bellflower because he was selling homes to minorities.
“Bruce was committed to selling to all people,” Rush said.
Mulhearn’s son, Kirk, wearing a Scottish tam o’shanter, recalled how his father was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, a lethal lung disease, 11 years ago and was given three-to-five years to live but didn’t tell anyone about it, except for his wife.
“He kept it to himself because he didn’t want people to fuss over him,” his son said, choking up.
Elaine Denham, Mulhearn’s daughter, said that, when she was a teenager, she thought her father was “a little crazy” because he was a fitness fanatic who pushed her to get in shape.
“One day, a horrible hurricane came to Long Beach,” she said. “The wind was blowing, there was debris all over on the beach. My father woke me up that morning and said, ‘Let’s run.’”
She said, now as a grown woman, she realized the many things her father taught her, “like perseverance, never giving up, never getting discouraged and valuing good friendships and relationships.”
She said her father had “a brave heart” and even while gasping for breath in his final days, “he held me in his arms.”
In a video shown near the end of the celebration, Mulhearn himself was on two giant screens with “the last word.” He told them to embrace each of the 86,400 seconds they will face each day.
“Remember to enjoy every second of your life because time races by so much more quickly than you think,” he said. “So, take care of yourself, be happy, love deeply, and enjoy life.”