Rosedale expansion takes shape

ROSEDALE — An expansion to the Rosedale community has begun quietly.

The Hunt Group’s Newton Development, which developed the original roughly 650-home community off State Road 70, just east of I-75, is nearing the start of construction for Rosedale Links, with three model homes already built.

Home sales for Rosedale Links are expected to begin sometime in November, when the models open.

“It’s a great location,” said Matt Bornstein, sales-and-marketing director for Rosedale Realty, noting entrances to the Links will be from Rosedale’s main entrance and from 44th Avenue. “We’ve held the land for a while. We feel the timing is right.”

The expansion, which encompasses about 231 acres adjacent to Rosedale’s Highland neighborhood, sits roughly north of Malachite Drive and south of the 44th Avenue extension, immediately west of Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine’s new dental school.

Developers closed on the land in 2005 and had originally planned to construct an additional nine holes of golf on the site. Plans changed, however, as the real-estate market came to a standstill. Newton Development altered its course to include about 450 new single-family homes, instead of the golf course, and 306 units it had envisioned previously.

Newton Development group’s single-family homes will range in size from 1,790 to 2,350 square feet and start at $290,000, Bornstein said.

Newton Development also is bringing in outside builders to help expedite the build-out of the project, Bornstein said. M/I Homes' Tampa Division and Ashton Woods Homes, of Tampa, both will be constructing models, as will East County-based John Cannon Homes, which will be building estate homes.
Infrastructure for Rosedale Links already is in place, and model home construction for all three outside builders is expected to begin in the coming weeks through January.

Future residents of Rosedale Links will enjoy access to existing amenities at Rosedale, including a semi-public clubhouse, tennis courts, a junior-sized Olympic pool, bocce courts, an exercise facility and an existing 18-hole golf course, Bornstein said.

The project is developer-funded, so there are no community development district assessments.

Contact Pam Eubanks at [email protected].