THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, June 29, 1996 TAG: 9606270304
SECTION: REAL ESTATE WEEKLY PAGE: 04 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JEANNE MOONEY, SPECIAL TO REAL ESTATE WEEKLY
LENGTH: 142 lines
Wayne Whitehurst is a popular man these days in Suffolk. His name is all around town. People, it seems, can't live without him.
Really.
Whitehurst is chief of the city's building department. He's the guy who has to sign the permit that is needed before anyone moves into a new home.
Well, there are lots of new single-family homes going up in Suffolk. And lots more planned. You see, it's boom time for home building in Suffolk.
And Whitehurst and his small staff are running hard to keep up with the demand. They typically inspect a new home 11 to 14 times before it is finished.
``We're pedaling as fast as we can,'' Whitehurst says. But, he says of the call for inspections, ``It's like being in a car and you can't control the accelerator.''
No wonder. In the past five years, single-family homes starts in Suffolk have rocketed, increasing by nearly 400 percent.
In 1991, 162 single-family homes were started. In 1995, the number climbed to 806. And this year's home-starts are just 13 homes shy of last year's pace, city records show.
Suffolk's numbers may not seem big compared to, say, Virginia Beach's, where home-starts hit a high of 4,125 in 1986.
But they are significant when one considers that much of the residential growth is concentrated in one portion of this sprawling city - namely, in northern Suffolk.
``We see it all around, in the restaurants you eat in and in the churches,'' Sammy Copeland, co-owner of Tidewater Properties LTD, a real estate firm, says of the growth. ``And I hear this from other people: You're getting a lot of new faces.''
More newcomers are expected, too. From now until 2005, about 1,000 new homes will be built in Suffolk, the Planning Department predicts. Half of them will go up in the northern section of the city.
Peggy Byrd is poised to greet the market. She moved her business north from central Suffolk and merged it with Copeland's. Now she works from Bridge Road.
``It's been a good move,'' Byrd says. She is back in sales, which she wanted. And, she says, ``The business opportunities seemed better here.''
Why are people moving to northern Suffolk?
One reason has to do with that L-word. You know the one: Location!
``It used to be kind of the end of the road,'' David M. Gist, a human services planner with the Hampton Roads Planning District Commission, says of northern Suffolk. ``It's more in the heart of things, say, then 10 years ago.''
Interstate 664, the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel and the Western Freeway/Route 164 have helped open northern Suffolk. The highways put commuters within striking distance of jobs on the Peninsula and in downtown Norfolk.
Robert T. Williams recites a familiar refrain about northern Suffolk's accessibility: ``We're 20 minutes from anywhere you want to go.''
Of course Williams' view of northern Suffolk begins with Harbour View, a huge development of homes, businesses and industry planned for northern Suffolk near I-664 and U.S. Route 17.
Williams is executive vice president of The Jorman Group, which is helping manage the Harbour View development. He hears the reasons why people build and buy in Burbage Grant, a residential community of about 1,500 homes under construction.
``They're glad to be out of the traffic,'' he says. Home buyers say the schools aren't crowded. And, they believe they can buy more house for their money in Suffolk.
Builders and developers believe it, too. The cost of labor and materials isn't cheaper in Suffolk, they say, but the land is. And that affects the price of the home.
Better still, buildable, open land, often zoned for residential use, is available in Suffolk. The supply is limited in Chesapeake and Virginia Beach, and that pushes up the value of the property there.
``You can still purchase land at a reasonable price'' in Suffolk, says Beth Hughes, marketing director with the Alan Resh Group of Virginia Beach. That's lucrative for the developer and makes for affordable homes for the buyer.
Vincent A. Napolitano is building Suburban Woods, a community of 134 homes off Suburban Drive in northern Suffolk. The lots will range in size from 10,000 square feet to one-half acre. The homes will offer 1,700 to 2,500 square feet of living space. And they will sell for $110,000 to $130,000, Napolitano says.
``You can't buy a house in that range any more in Chesapeake,'' Napolitano says. ``You'll be paying in the $140,000s on up.''
Ripe as it may be for residential development, a few developers say getting the needed approval from city planners to begin work is fraught with delays and frustrating.
``I've lost all concept of time out here in Suffolk,'' says Rick Byers, a builder, developer and president of Pughsville Building Corp. of Norfolk. ``It's just taking forever to get anything done.''
Byers wants to build affordable homes on 17 lots in the Pughsville section of the city. Fourteen months ago the city granted preliminary approval for his project's plat. Since then, he says he has wrangled over what recreation amenities he would provide. Now he's been told he must reapply for plat approval because it expired after 12 months.
``They're trying to control growth and this is the way they're doing it,'' he says. ``By delaying projects.''
``There's no deliberate delay on the part of the Planning Commission,'' says E. Dana Dickens, vice chairman. The only delay he can see, he says, is caused by a lack of staff in the Planning Department to handle the increasing volume of work.
Paul E. Fisher, director of Suffolk's Planning Department, won't talk about any specific residential proposals, but he says he is not happy with the amount of time it takes his department to review residential development proposals.
But Fisher also offers this perspective: the volume of work for his department has increased on many fronts, while the level of staff has changed modestly. For instance, the staff carried out seven major subdivision reviews in 1991, while in 1995 they did 41. Meanwhile, the authorized level of staff in that time increased from 10 to 11 people.
Fisher has since won approval to add two more people to staff.
Fisher also points out that the city also must often involve the state Department of Transportation in its review of proposed housing developments. That takes time, typically 80 to 90 days.
Dickens, meanwhile, says the city must measure the impact of each development on city services - police, fire, schools, library, recreation, water, utilities and roads, to name a few.
Commissioners can get ``heartburn'' if those subdivisions have a negative fiscal impact on the city - that is, require more in city services than they can support through taxes and fees, he says. But commissioners are not going slow to stop growth.
``We will grow,'' Dickens says. ``There will be development. There's no way to stop that. Our job is to make it as good as it can be.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo on cover by JOHN H. SHEALLY II
Burbage Grant in Harbour View development.
Color photos by JOHN H. SHEALLY II
Burbage Grant is part of the mammoth Harbour View development and is
occupied by 1,500 homes.
Ten to 15 percent of the home buyers in Woodlake are already from
Suffolk.
Many of those moving to Suffolk believe they get more house for
their money. by CNB