Good Luck BuilderFriday, January 13, 2012 Gulf Coast Business Review | Jean Gruss
There’s nothing quite like the development of a new residential community to suggest an economic recovery.
Sunrise-based GL Homes is just weeks away from the opening of
Riverstone, a new residential community off Immokalee Road in Naples.
The new development is spread over 640 acres and will have 850
single-family homes when it’s completed. GL Homes is building seven
models and has started 18 speculative homes in time for the community’s
Jan. 28 opening.
“Naples is just still so desirable,” says Patty Campbell, president
of the Southwest Florida division of GL Homes. The privately held
company doesn’t disclose financial details, but Builder Magazine says
the company ranked as the 30th largest builder in the U.S. in 2010 with
$330 million in revenues.
GL Homes has been building in the area through the downturn while
many of its competitors fled the area. For example, it opened Marbella
Lakes in Naples in February 2009 and recently sold out of 282
single-family homes and 208 condos there.
In Fort Myers, where residential development suffered more, the
company sold 232 homes over the last three years at Botanica Lakes.
Since that development opened in 2005, GL Homes has sold 510 of the 685
homes there.
While the company’s initials stand for “Good Luck,” the company’s
sales didn’t happen by chance. Campbell attributes GL’s momentum to good
locations and attractive prices. “We didn’t have any bad land buys,”
she says. “Our land holdings are ‘A’ locations.”
Homes at Riverstone will cost from $300,000 to $600,000 and will
range in size from 2,000 square feet to 4,650 square feet. “The price is
key,” Campbell says.
But GL also has been nimble, responding to buyers’ needs. For
example, it included lawn maintenance in the homeowners’ association
fees because many residents are seasonal. Such fees will cost less than
$300 a month at Riverstone, relatively low because there’s no expensive
golf course to maintain and no community development district debt.
Campbell, a former Burger King executive, says GL expects to sell 125
to 150 new homes at Riverstone this year. The company has designed
homes with bigger lanais, larger sliding-glass windows, bigger laundry
rooms with extra storage space and larger master bathrooms.
Already, Campbell says about 1,500 people have inquired about homes
at Riverstone and she’s had to hire a security guard to keep prospective
buyers from clogging the busy construction zone.
Campbell expects a mix of buyers at Riverstone, including families of
working professionals and seasonal retirees. She says about 60% of
seasonal residents pay cash for a new home and families are having an
easier time qualifying for mortgages. “The banks have loosened it up a
little,” she says. “People aren’t getting denied.”
|