Nine potential Colony investors remain

The Colony Beach & Tennis Resort Association whittled its list of renovation and development proposals from 16 to nine at a Wednesday, April 13 board meeting.

Colony Association President Jay Yablon informed unit owners in an e-mail Friday, April 15 that the following companies have moved on to the next round:
• St. Louis-based AdamsMark L.P.
• Longboat Key-based Arendee Colony (Colony Lender)
• Broomfield, Co.,-based Quintess;
• Naples-based Coral Hospitality;
• Sarasota-based Floridays Development Co.;
• Sonoma County, Calif.,-based Mayacama;
• Sarasota-based MW Development & Investment Advisory;
• Delray Beach-based Ocean Properties;
• New York-based Starwood Capital Group.

Out of the nine remaining contenders, only MW Development & Investment Advisory and Mayacama are suggesting a complete teardown and rebuild of the property.

The strategic consultant who is working with the Colony Association to find the right development plan for the resort sent a letter to the nine remaining developers that explains he wants to set up a video conference with each of them.

The following criteria is necessary from each proposed developer and was listed in the letters verbatim:
• Vision and concept — Explain your vision and concept for the Colony, both short-term and long-term.
• Facilities and amenities — Detail what facilities and amenities will be included in the development and whether there is any cost to owners, and if there is a cost, provide detail.
• Estimated costs of renovation/development — Provide detail on how you will determine estimated costs of renovations or new development and timing required to obtain such information.
• Financing — both for owner and the project. Provide detail as to any financing you will make available to owners and how you intend to finance the overall concept, including the source of financing.
• Purchase of units — If you are planning to offer to acquire units, please detail pricing, terms and conditions.
• Owner usage — Detail options for owner usage of the Colony.
• Owner’s capital or other investment required — Provide a detailed summary of any capital or other investment that will be required from owners.
• Proponent capital investment — Provide a detailed summary of any capital, if any, that you plan to invest in the Colony.
• Management proposal — Provide a summary of your approach and proposal for the ongoing management of the Colony.
• Legal requirements — Provide a summary of how you will plan to address any legal and regulatory requirements associated with a renovation or new development, such as, but not limited to FEMA.
• Financial capability — Provide details of your financial capability to support your proposal including sources of financing.

The association is giving each developer an hour-and-a-half for their presentation, and written proposals are required two weeks after the presentations are made to the board.

The 232 unit owners will eventually select the winning proposal by a 75% majority vote.

• Flexible options for owners — Provide details of how you would simultaneously accommodate owners who are willing and able to make a large capital reinvestment into their own units to maximize use and control of their units, whose who may be willing to relinquish some share of their use and control to minimize their costs, and those in the middle.

The rest include renovations and restorations of existing units, along with partial teardowns. And, Colony Lender LLC, which owns bank notes currently in foreclosure on resort parcels, made the list with a proposal that suggests all unit owners sign over the titles to their units to create a timeshare facility in exchange for a new five-star resort.

Contact Kurt Schultheis at [email protected]

Click here to read Hemke's entire letter in PDF format.

Colony continuance request submitted
The Colony Beach & Tennis Resort Association submitted a continuance request to the Longboat Key Town Commission April 13, which asks the town to extend its tourism abandonment requirement for the property until Dec. 31, 2012.

If the Longboat Key Town Commission approves the continuance request at its 7 p.m. Monday, May 2 regular meeting, the Colony will stay closed for at least another 20 months.

In its request, Colony Association attorney Donald Hemke said the association has diligently spent time, effort and money toward planning a restoration of the resort.

“There is no public interest in attempting to assert any artificial one-year deadline, which could result in the loss of 129 tourism units at a tourism resort and create almost unimaginably thorny problems for the 232 (unit owners) at the Colony, which problems would inevitably spill over to the town,” wrote Hemke. “It would be better for the association, for the unit owners and for the town that the Colony be re-opened in a way that makes good business sense, to avoid significant short-term expenses, which may not be consistent with the long-term restoration or redevelopment of the Colony, and to avoid damaging the brand which the Colony and Longboat Key have spent years to develop.”