Top Stories - Sarasota: December

A Jacksonville firm has acquired a vacant 15-acre waterfront site in downtown Sarasota, previously the Sarasota Quay, that some consider the best development opportunity on the Gulf Coast.

GreenPointe Communities, a subsidiary of Jacksonville-based GreenPointe Holdings, announced the deal in a statement today. The company bought the parcel for $27 million, according to firm spokeswoman Susie Wiles.

The firm says it will move forward with planning and design on a project that can link downtown with the Arts District and will include residential, commercial, retail and hospitality elements. GreenPointe bought the site from the Irish government, which owned the property after Anglo-Irish Bank there had taken it back in a default proceeding.

“Our company is poised to bring this important parcel to life for Sarasota residents and visitors alike,” GreenPointe Chairman and CEO Ed Burr says in the statement. “We have been pleased at the warm response we have received in Sarasota and look forward to being a part of the fabric of one of Florida’s fastest growing, culturally rich and vibrant regions.”

Burr, a prominent business leader in the Jacksonville area, founded GreenPointe Communities in 2008. Other firms he has founded and run have designed and developed more than 30 master-planned communities and developments across the Southeast.

GreenPointe will follow a few others that have tried to buy and redevelop the former Quay site, vacant since 2007. Irish developer Patrick Kelly, through Irish American Properties Inc., bought the site in 2004 and demolished the buildings. He had planned a large mixed-use project, Sarasota Bayside, just before the real estate market crash and the project never got going.