Palm Harbor Residents Angry About Decline in Property Values – Blame Centex

Is the weak real estate market solely responsible for declining Palm Harbor home values or is Centex partly to blame?

April 24, 2007 – Palm Coast City Manager, Jim Landon, held another neighborhood meeting last night to bring residents up to date on the City’s progress with Centex negotiations. Palm Harbor Resort and golf course negotiations are on track but residents voiced serious concerns about declining property value and salability of their homes. One resident asked Landon “When will I be able to advertise my house as having golf course frontage?”

Centex abandoned plans to reconstruct the Palm Harbor Golf Course as a Jack Nicklaus tournament level course designed to augment its new Condo Hotel. They stopped maintenance last year. Since, they have killed the grass, damaged the irrigation system beyond repair, and demolished the clubhouse.

The Palm Harbor neighborhood represents the core of “old Palm Coast” with many homes on salt water canals or the golf course. In a soft real estate market, it’s easy and natural to blame Centex for dropping home values and slowing sales. How do these claims hold up?

During the first half of 2006, Palm Harbor represented 12.26% of existing residential homes sold in Flagler. In the second half of the year, this had dropped to 11.31%. While Palm Harbor homes represent 13.2% of all current listings for existing single family homes in the county, they have accounted for only 9.74% of homes sold YTD. Only three golf course homes have sold since July 1, 2006. It seems the residents’ claims are valid.

Unlike the first neighborhood meeting, public input, while sometimes firm, was polite. Many residents praised the City’s progress. A few interesting and important points from the meeting:  

• Centex has asked for a two year extension to the Development Order to make the Palm Harbor Resort properties more attractive to other developers.
• Centex will donate the golf course but not the residentially zoned property bordering the course (approved for condos).
• A parcel west of the City was considered earlier as a possible site for a public golf course. It was recently appraised at $13,000,000. This makes the Palm Harbor venue look even better.
• Centex has asked that the City amend the Development Order to allow down-sized condominium units at the resort site. They also want to add the flexibility to substitute a standard hotel for the condo hotel, opening up the option to sell that part of the project to a Marriott or Hilton type operator.
• Landon reiterated the City’s priorities – 1) get the golf course back to life and 2) get a resort hotel with swimming, a restaurant, and meeting rooms as soon as possible.
• Landon hopes construction on the golf course will start this fall with completion in late 2008.