Starlight Homes has a contract to buy 25 acres next to Lakeview Elementary from the Osceola County Schools for $4.56 million and plans to build a new townhouse community on the vacant land.
The sale contract initially was approved the School Board in October 2021 but it has been extended and revised five times, most recently to raise the purchase price based the number of units in the proposed Heritage Crossing community.
The sale is subject to City Council approval of the Planned Unit Development rezoning that would entitle the site for 198 townhomes, plus an amenity center and pocket park. The PUD master plan call for a mix of front-loaded units with single-car garages and rear-loaded units with double-car garages. John Adams, vice president of Rj Whidden & Associates represented the homebuilder Thursday during a Development Review Committee meeting and stressed that homebuilder needs to get on the April 18 Planning Commission agenda and City Council meetings in late April and early May. “It’s extraordinarily important for their contractual obligations,” he said.
All front-loaded townhomes could be prohibited in St. Cloud as of June 1 if the City Council adopts a set of architectural standards at its April 14 meeting. The proposed ordinance that was approved on first reading in February contained conflicting language and images regarding garage doors for townhomes. Now it explicitly states that townhomes and duplexes can only have a front-loaded garage if the primary facade is 40 feet wide.
The revised ordinance also prohibit front-loaded garages on single family detached homes if the lot is less than 50 feet wide. Osceola County’s standard is 45 feet. And it keeps the language that requires all builders to install brick or stone on at least 20% of the primary facade.
Any PUD with an approved master plan before June 1 would be exempt from the new standards. One issue that must be resolved early next week is whether the builder will include a future road connection to the west at Jacks Memorial Road. Adams said the master plan allows for a potential stub out at that location if the city acquires right-of-way to make the connection.
The elevations and PUD language for Heritage Crossing illustrates an effort to comply with some of the standards in the ordinance. It points out the enhanced rooflines on each building type utilizing alternating gables, hips, eyebrows, shed roofs, corbels, and brackets. “The townhome buildings meet the massing and composition requirements using colors, the use of alternating Hardie siding materials, the use of belly bands, roof line changes, and ornamentation using corbels and brackets. Material transitions will occur at inside corners or wrap a minimum of 18 inches around an outside corner.”
Starlight Homes is a division of Ashton Woods that emphasizes affordability.
The school district previously offered the site for sale back in 2018 with a minimum purchase price of $1.4 million. Pulte Homes was the sole bidder at $1.53 million, but the school board ended up rejected the bid. The district later engaged Jill Rose with Bishop Beale Duncan for real estate services, and she brought the buyer, school officials said.
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