First home of Federated Properties to arrive
Delivery of the first Cape Cod model home to the tax-free Renaissance Zone lots in Rogers City was delayed earlier this week as the pre-built structure was held up in Indiana. Developer Michael Uzelac of Federated Properties was hoping the three-bedroom home, which will eventually have a porch and an attached garage, would be in this week or early next. Bad weather may delay the delivery. Because of the relatively mild winter, Federated was able to get started with the foundation work, which has put the project ahead of schedule.
Delivery of the home was originally scheduled for Monday. Once the house is in place, it will be six to seven weeks before it looks like the final product. It will be the first of two model homes to go up before an open house tentatively scheduled for Saturday, May 20, Uzelac said. There will only be a crawl space for the first model home, while the second is expected to have a basement.
?WE ARE looking forward to getting a house up there because we feel that the first structure that goes up will attract some attention,? said Dick Long, Community Development Authority (CDA) chairman. ?We are going to be working with local builders and local individuals to do the excavating, some carpentry work, and some finish work. True to his word, he is going to try to hire these people to keep things coordinated.? Birchwood Construction of Harbor Springs is the general contractor for the project. Federated Properties is based in Farming Hills has been involved in larger-scale projects in Petoskey and Traverse City. The company is currently working on constructing a 100-foot-tall building in Traverse City that includes 530 public parking spaces.
The CDA exercised the options on the parcels that were once occupied by Ken?s Oil, Storm?s Ice, and Darga Forest Products, in 2000. With a Brownfield Redevelopment grant, the site was cleaned of contamination, but the process took longer than city officials expected. ?Once we got the baseline environmental assessment, it is like having a health chart in the live stock industry; not until you have a clean bill of health, do you have a marketable product. We did not have that until 2003,? said Long.
CITY MANAGER John Bruning is looking forward to seeing continued progress at the site. ?We need it,? he added. ?We have been looking forward to this,? said Long. ?There have been other inquiries, and it?s sad to say, there would have been people that would have built in there, had we had that baseline environmental assessment a lot earlier.? Uzelac said there already has been interest expressed in the homes that come with a price tag of about $180,000 each, in part because of the tax savings that will come from the development being in a tax-free area. There would be no property or state income taxes that will have to be paid by residents unti
For example, a couple with a combined taxable income of $50,000, who buy and occupy the home as their homestead at the asking price of $180,000 would realize the following savings: property tax savings, $4,590 per year; income tax savings, $1,950. The combined tax savings would be about $6,540 per year. This is based on 51-mills. Uzelac added that living in a Renaissance Zone is also the best place to be if those lucky numbers come in from the lottery, because taxes do not have to be paid. He also said residents are exempt from the capitol gains tax.
The 22-site condominium homes will be BOCA approved modular homes, which will range in size from 1,260 to 2,100 square feet.