Homebuilder buys Moore's Dairy site for $4.7 million

HERITAGE HARBOUR — A local homebuilder has purchased 289 acres by the Heritage Harbour community out of foreclosure. The purchased ends, at least temporarily, uncertainty surrounding the site formerly home to Moore’s Dairy.

Upper Manatee 288 LLC, a Bradenton company managed by homebuilder and developer Carlos Beruff, of Medallion Home, has purchased the site at 112 Upper Manatee River Road for $4.7 million.

“We bought it with a long-term view,” Beruff said. “We’re not rushing to go out and do anything, other than (get) ideas of what we might do in the future with it. We’re slow and methodical — like a tortoise.

“We plan on sitting on it for a bit,” he said. “(The property) does have some entitlements we are reviewing.”

Heritage Harbour’s original developer, Lennar Corp., in early 2008 had planned to add the site to the Heritage Harbour community, extending the existing Stoneybrook subdivision east to Upper Manatee River Road.

Heritage Harbour Development, the property’s former owner, defaulted on a $10.5 million revolving line of credit secured by the former dairy-farm site in September 2010. The company, owned by attorney Ronald Black, of Maitland, purchased the land for $8.7 million in early 2005 and lost it to foreclosure in June 2011.

Upper Manatee 288 purchased the property from BB&T Bank Oct. 30, using a $4.8 million loan from Best Prize Property LLC. The deal closed Dec. 2.

Beruff said development of the property is still years away, because needs in the new-home market already are being met by developments such as Central Park, Woodbrook and Riva Trace, among others. If Upper Manatee 288 does pursue residential development of the property, it wouldn’t begin until late 2014 or 2015, he said.

“We don’t think the economy substantiates bringing on more product,” Beruff said. “(But) we like the location. We think it has good potential for the future.”

Commercial development on the property also could be an option, depending on what type of development the economy demands, Beruff said.

Beruff said he first began looking at the property more than two years ago.

Gulf Coast Business Review Real Estate Editor Sean Roth contributed to this report.

Contact Pam Eubanks at [email protected].