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Four fully-furnished, designer-decorated model residences in Quail West’s coveted North Lake neighborhood will be featured during the upcoming joint single-site CBIA, LBIA Parade of Homes. The 2014 single-site Parade of Homes will be held at Quail West Thursday, Jan. 23 through Sunday, Jan. 26 and Thursday, Jan. 30 through Sunday, Feb. 2, 2014. Hours Thursday through Saturday are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Visitors will be asked to pay a $5 admission fee to support the LBIA and CBIA foundation.
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From NaplesNews.com
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New model home opens in Ravenna at Miromar Lakes
London Bay Homes’ Girona model nearing completion at Mediterra
RISMEDIA, Thursday, September 26, 2013
According to recently released data from the Survey of Construction (SOC), the trend toward smaller home sizes, which started during the market downturn, has since reversed itself. In fact, since 2009, the median size of newly started single-family homes has increased steadily to a record high of over 2,300 square feet last year.
The SOC is conducted by the Census Bureau, partly funded by HUD, and the source of the familiar monthly series on housing starts. House size is one of several characteristics in the SOC data that NAHB analyzed in a recentHousingEconomics.com Special Study.
In addition to square footage, several other new home characteristics show an upward trend after 2009. The average number of bathrooms in new, single-family homes rose to a new high of 2.56 in 2012 following a period in which it edged down to as low as 2.20 in 2009. The average number of bedrooms in newly started homes also declined during the downturn, but has since very gradually increased.
The pattern of temporary decline in house size during a downturn followed by recovery and resumption of the upward trend has happened before—the last time coincident with the recession and recovery of the early 1980s. Many experts thought that the decline in the 2000s was due to factors that would prove to be more permanent, such as desire to keep energy costs down.
When the size of new homes began to rise again in 2010, tight credit conditions were squeezing many first time and other marginal buyers out of the market. As of 2012, housing markets had only recovered to a modest extent, so an atypical mix of buyers in the market could still be a factor behind the ongoing upward trend in the size of new homes.
View this original post on the NAHB blog, Eye on Housing.
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That boom you heard is Southwest Florida building industry: It’s back
Naples Makes Top 10 Turnaround List
By KELLY FARRELL | Monday, September 9, 2013
EAST NAPLES — A huge new East Naples development with an Old Florida twist soon will offer boat tours through the community to prospective home buyers.
Canadian-based Minto Communities has groundwork underway in the 2,400-acre residential community, Isles of Collier Preserve, off U.S. 41 East near Rattlesnake Hammock Road.
Minto Communities purchased the land from Collier Enterprises, closing in December, and then broke ground in January and began developing the environmentally sensitive land east of Naples Bay.
The Isles of Collier Preserve is to be considerably different than the manicured, gated communities throughout Collier County, developers said.
“Most Naples communities are very manicured. We’ll have some manicured boulevards. We’ll also have a lot of areas that preserve the native habitat with a community carefully carved into the existing environment,” said William Bullock, vice president of Minto Communities Florida.
Some of the initial work, including the guardhouse, entry boulevard and 175 lots, are complete. Construction is underway on the 7,330-square-foot Discovery Sales Center, where an electric boat for tours will soon be docked, and four single-family model homes and three coach homes.
The Isles of Collier Preserve is near Rookery Bay and the Botanical Gardens and has sought to complement those neighbors, sponsoring them and collaborating with them in the community’s design.
“We’ve also done our historical research. The bridges will be reminiscent of the Old 41 markers. There will be a story to be told about this community. It’s a very big last piece of land in Naples and we’re painting a different picture here. We think people will be proud to live here, have a story and a legacy they can tell,” Bullock said.
The community will be active and nature-loving.
“Forget about just the house lifestyle. It’s about understanding what’s around you in the first place,” he said.
The Isles of Collier Preserve is home to several protected species, but also has some exotic vegetation being replaced with native plant species, making improvements to the land, Bullock said.
Company officials said Minto Communities intends to stay ahead of the curve with environmentally conscious construction for this East Naples community, where homes will be beside habitats for American Bald Eagles, gopher tortoises and other endangered and protected animals. Government oversight is thorough due to the sensitivity of the area, including wetlands, estuaries and other ecological features.
More than half of the land is to remain dedicated to natural habitat and preserve. The waterway that runs through the community will provide for tours on the electric boat set to be running by November, as well as kayaking and canoeing when homes become move-in ready sometime in 2014. Recreational trails, walkways and bike paths will allow residents to connect with their environment.
The Discovery Sales Center’s construction is of an Old Florida design that will be an architectural feature of the single-family and coach homes, also coming soon. Seven model homes are anticipated to be open for viewing in January.
Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve is to the south, Naples Botanical Garden to the North and Naples Bay is on the west of The Isles of Collier Preserve. Hamilton Harbor Yacht Club is also contiguous with The Isles of Collier Preserve and has memberships that can be available to residents.
About 1,600 residences are planned. The homes will be energy-efficient, featuring green Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) construction with the consumer having the opportunity for an individual efficiency and sustainability rating for their home.
Many of the homes will start at a list price slightly more than $400,000 with the bulk of the initial homes in the range of $650,000 to $750,000.
“We’re going to let the market dictate a lot,” he said.
There will be many larger estate homes farther back in the community on larger lots that will be well over $1 million. These estate homes will feature the communities’ most breathtaking views, Bullock said.
© 2013 Scripps Newspaper Group — Online
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Showcase of Homes at Moorings Park
Torino models at Grey Oaks
By LAURA LAYDEN | Sunday, February 17, 2013
NAPLES — Builders in the Naples market are investing millions in houses with no buyers.With the housing market on the rebound, the speculative, or so called “spec” market has made a comeback, especially in areas near the water such as Port Royal, Aqualane Shores, Coquina Sands and Old Naples.In the past year, more high-end custom builders have been buying lots and putting multimillion-dollar houses on them, expecting buyers to come. And buyers have come, sometimes snatching up houses before they’re finished.Spec home building slowed to a virtual halt after the red-hot housing market went bust starting in 2006, but it’s back.
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41 West, a longtime luxury builder in Naples, decided to start building spec homes again last summer after a four-year pause.”Builders like myself are building homes on a speculative basis. Where everybody has been afraid of their own shadow for the last four years, people are stepping up. It’s a totally different market,” said William Bayes, 41 West’s vice president of operations.It’s a different market because the inventory of both new homes and resales has shrunk, which is slowly driving up prices.41 West’s decision to get back into speculative building came after Naples-area Realtors saw one of their busiest summers for sales in a decade, Bayes said.
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Other builders jumped back into the speculative market more quickly than 41 West, with construction picking up noticeably last year, such as in Old Naples.During the past two years, Waterside Builders built two quaint cottages off Third Street South that fetched some of the highest prices per square foot seen in Old Naples, said Mike Assaad, the company’s president.Buyers paid more than $1,000 per square foot for the living space under air and one of the homes was a spec that brought $2.6 million, he said.”There are a lot more buyers at $2.5 million than there are at $4 million or $5 million,” Assaad said.
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While much of the speculative building is near the water, it has picked up elsewhere in Collier County, including Mediterra, the luxury golf community straddling the Lee-Collier county line off Livingston Road.Most of the builder’s spec homes have been priced at $1 million to $3 million. They are three- and four-bedroom homes, ranging from 3,000 to 5,400 square feet.The builder will soon start similar spec homes in downtown Naples and Quail West, another golf community east of Interstate 75 between Bonita Beach and Immokalee roads.
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WCI Communities Inc., a Bonita Springs-based home builder, has spec homes in all five of its gated communities in Collier and Lee counties.WCI has two communities in Collier, including Tiburon in north Collier, where it’s building four spec homes with four and five bedrooms, priced at about $1 million. They’ll range from 3,800 to 4,500 square feet.There are another seven spec homes under construction at WCI’s Manchester Square community off Livingston Road, north of Pine Ridge Road.”We definitely have increased spec count,” Wolf said. “Last year, we were kind of following a sell one, replace one (strategy). This year, there has been enough demand that we are putting out two specs for every one that we sell.”
© 2013 Scripps Newspaper Group — Online
Submitted by Tani Hurley Public Relations | Sunday, January 20, 2013
Developers have closed on 2,262 acres in East Naples, marking the second largest land deal in Collier County in recent months. Hacienda Lakes of Naples LLC purchased the property from Wilton Land Company LLC for $63.7 million, according to county records.
“The scope of this project and the implications for third-party involvement suggests an important economic boost for this area,” said David E. Torres, president of Hacienda Lakes of Naples LLC. “We have working diligently to secure all of the various permits required for development, and we’re ready now to move forward at a rapid pace.”
Hacienda Lakes lies to the east of Collier Boulevard and encompasses lands bordered by Willow Run Quarry to the north and stretches south of Physicians Regional Medical Center.
Over 1,500 acres — more than half of the total area — will be left as a preserve area. The project is permitted to include 1,760 homes; 327,000 square feet of retail space; 70,000 square feet of professional and medical office space; 135 hotel rooms; 140,000 gross square feet of business park or educational facility; and a public school.
The development process of Hacienda Lakes will include an extension of Rattlesnake-Hammock Road east of Collier Boulevard as well as other roadwork within the project that will also serve the public, such as a wider bridge and improvements at the intersection.
Hacienda Lakes has been approved for the establishment of a Community Development District, and both the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the South Florida Water Management District have given approval for the plans for Hacienda Lakes.
Development of Hacienda Lakes is expected to take place in phases over the next eight years.
“We’re optimistic about the timetable,” Torres said. “We’ve already had numerous inquiries from firms interested in being involved, and we expect to announce the builder of our first neighborhood within a few weeks.”
For more information about Hacienda Lakes, email info@napleshacienda.com.
© 2013 Scripps Newspaper Group — Online
RISMEDIA, Thursday, January 17, 2013— Builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes was unchanged in January, remaining at a level of 47 on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index, released today. This means that following eight consecutive monthly gains, the index continues to hold at its highest level since April of 2006.
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