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November 1, 2006

Developer set to break ground on Evening Rose

Project to comply with inclusionary housing ordinance

Ferdie De Vega
From the Tallahassee Democrat

Brandy Willis says she had two main requirements while searching for a home in Tallahassee: She wanted a new house, and it had to be near the hospitals.

The Florida State University medical student, who is graduating in the spring, said she and husband Grant recently found a place in town at Evening Rose, a new "traditional neighborhood development" from K2 Urbancorp LLC. The company is scheduled to hold a ceremony today at 11 a.m. to launch the project, located inside Capital Circle Northeast and just north of Mahan Drive.

Willis said she liked the idea of a "nostalgic, old-time community, ... how it's set up to encourage interaction among those who live in the community."

Dave Wamsley, K2 Urbancorp's CEO and managing member, said Evening Rose will be the first true, traditional in-town neighborhood built within the city limits. He noted that the company is "borrowing from practices of the past." The homes will be within walking distance of the commercial buildings and retailers and restaurants in the "pedestrian-friendly" Town Center, he said.

Evening Rose will feature 99 home sites - 74 detached single-family homes and 25 attached townhomes. Ten of them will be inclusionary-housing units, Wamsley said. They "will be priced for income-eligible buyers as determined by the city of Tallahassee.

"This is the first development to work with the city (under its new inclusionary zoning ordinance). We did it voluntarily," he said. "By partnering with the city and providing the inclusionary-housing units, we were able to get expedited permitting and expedited platting."

With the publicity that K2 Urbancorp's new development has received, "other developers are looking at making inclusionary, and more importantly workforce housing, a part of their developments," Wamsley said.

He said Evening Rose will have five primary home styles: bungalows, cottages, Mediterranean revival, neo-traditional, including Jeffersonian and Georgian, and the eclectic series, including Tudor and Spanish Mediterranean.

The first homes are scheduled to be complete in April, Wamsley said. The cost of the single-family homes will start in the low $300,000s, the townhomes will be priced in the mid-$200,000 range and the cost of the custom and estate homes will start at $600,000.