Living next to non-Village residents in Fenney (5653 Spartina Terrace, Desoto)
 

Hello everyone,

A really nice pre-owned Ruby Patio Villa went up for sale in the Village of DeSoto (Fenney) at 5653 SPARTINA TERRACE. It's at the end of the street and is fenced on 2 sides, perfect right? Apparently the original owner(s) of the home lived there for a very short time and then "had a change of heart". We looked on Google maps for an overhead of the area and on the other side of the fence are non-Village residents in a variety of houses in a somewhat forested area.

We're in Michigan and have a call in to our Villages sales agent. I'm actually not even sure if those non-Villages residents are still there because the Google map might be old. Does anyone on the forum here live in that area and can comment on living in close proximity to non-Village residents? Is there any resentment about The Villages buying all the land in the area. Do the non-Village residents have a generally positive attitude about the Villages developing all the land around them? I'm always worried when I hear "change of heart" and the house seems so nice and in a great location.

Thanks for any information / opinions you can provide.

Mike from Michigan

Hmmmmm, that sounds pretty ominous....could someone clarify? Is it a noise issue?

People die. We had a neighbor pass on the very first day they lived there.

There is a very nice 80 year old who flips Villas in the new areas. She buys them new, and sells them in a year and makes money on them. We went to an open house, just driving by and curious.

I can't see anything wrong with known neighbors, whether they are villagers or not if they keep their property nice. I would worry about land that could change usage to something else.

I wouldn't ever buy something I hadn't seen, but that is just me.

The thing about having non-villages property on the other side of the fence is that you have no idea what might be going up on that property in the future. This area in general is being built up at at quite a clip by both The Villages and other builders.

When we were looking for our house in The Villages we told our agent we didn't want to look at any houses the bordered non-villages property for that reason.

On 466A there were quite a few Villages houses that bordered a very large plot of land. It was purchased by a builder (not The Villages) and now those houses are bordering a shopping center and what is supposed to be some apartment buildings. Overall it doesn't look all that bad but I sure the people in those houses didn't expect that to happen.

On the other hand if you look around the villages you will find many houses that border non-villages and everything has worked out fine. It's really up to you.

Nice to be in the middle of TV. All have the same rules. You have no control on the other side of the fence.

We were practicing golf at Loblolly on a Sunday and we noticed that at least one of the non-Village neighbors was burning a lot of trash and the smoke and smell were moving over the Loblolly golf course. I guess Sunday is trash burning day.

Since a lot of the non-Village houses along 468 are for sale, we wonder why The Villages did not buy them when they were building Fenney. I guess we will never know.

We were told that TV had offered to purchase but the offer was declined. TV apparently only makes one offer.

I need to confirm this with several bartenders. Wouldn’t want to be a source of rumors 😁

I've just noticed those "For Sale" signs the past month or so. Not sure they were interested when Fenney was being developed. Or they held out for a big payday that never came.

City Zoning
 

We learned the hard way, always go or call the planning department of the city that owns the land. Find out the zoning of the land in question. If its zoned commercial, you can expect shopping, restaurants, etc. If its zoned high density, you can expect potential apartments. DO NOT rely on a realtor for the full details!
Its your purchase, you be the researcher. Well worth the time and effort.

My parents bought a home next to an onion farm. One day the doorbell rang and they were handed a box of cheap chocolates from a K Mart representative. Goodbye onion farm.

That is a cautionary tale for all to remember.

Sent from my VS995 using Tapatalk

Villas usually have a wall behind them. There are also walls at the Villages borders. Some homes are on the edge of the property. There's nothing that you can do about that. If that bothers you, but elsewhere. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands of homes in The Villages.

A change of heart does not necessarily mean there is anything wrong with the house or its location. Some people move here and do decide that the lifestyle is not for them. When we lived in our first home here, one of our neighbors did just that. Moved here, stayed for 2 or 3 months, decided it wasn't for them and moved back north. We are on our second home, moved from a courtyard villa to a designer. We thought we could live with the smaller garage that was with the courtyard, decided we could not. So, in essence, we had a change of heart. There was nothing wrong with the courtyard villa, just decided that the designer home better suited our needs.
As the others have said, do your due dilligence. If you think living on the border of the community would be an issue for you, then maybe that isn't the house for you. You are the only one who can decide what is within your comfort zone.

All of the homes for sale along 468 are zoned commercial and I'm sure they are asking a healthy number for them. One of the larger parcels appears to already have been sold. There was also a 30 acre hold out on 501 adjoining McClure and I heard that TV now owns that parcel, also zoned commercial. The remaining homes on 468 will at some point end up being little plazas like there are all around TV. I just noticed the other day there is a sign up on the north side of 468 in the State Farm building for The Villages Golf Cars sales and repairs, never noticed it before and my guess would be that they bought the building as I don't think they would pay someone rent when they own so much land. The only complaint I have heard of down here about non-village neighbors was a dog barking all day while the owners were at work. They were talked with about it and the dog owners took care of the problem. I don't think there is much resentment, their property values sure jumped up. Also, a lot of those remaining might be renters with leases that haven't ended yet. I'm sure there are a lot of different reasons why they are still there.

I hope what you say is true. We were walking along 501 a couple weeks ago and we noticed that parcel and I hoped it was not going to be like that privately-owned parcel next to the Hampton Inn along 466. I hope it is sold to TV.

On the other hand, the new Trailwinds shopping area on 466A is not owned by TV and it seems very nice so far. We are looking forward to Jersey Mikes and we can dream about there possibly being a Tijuana Flats.

Thanks for all the input, I really appreciate it. I spoke with the sales agent and he had many of the same comments you did. It is re-zoned commercial and could be sold in the future for strip mall, apartments, etc. It's a great house but too risky for us not know what could possibly go in there in the future. With my luck a strip mall with a restaurant would go in and I'd have a trash bin right on the other side of the wall. We'll keep waiting for the right house to pop up.

I think you've made a wise decision. You never know what might be going on on the other side of that fence, or what the future might hold. I know you're looking for a Ruby patio villa, so did you also see this one? VLS#226963. It's a little more expensive, but still on a corner lot & has a bird cage attached to the lanai.

The pretty open pasture never stays open and pretty. I just would not take a chance on what is going in on the other side of the wall. But that’s just me

I always go with omunious gut feelings,..Non villager, hobbies might be turning his garage into a wood shop, or building a big metal boat, crack house, cat house, gambling den, stash house for human trafficking, cocaine cowboys...It is FLORIDA after all....

With the exception of building a big metal boat, I'm sure that all of the others are happening somewhere within TV.

Got any info, on the whereabouts of the cat house?:popcorn:

Try the dog pound.:doggie:

Buyer Beware
 

The people that bought homes in Pinellas, that back up to 466A, thought they had a nice woods view. Now they are going to be in the plume of Burger King's belching exhaust.

Caveat emptor.

While I cannot speak to this specific property, I did look at a designer on Lyall Loop (Fenney) that is on the edge of non-Villages property. We looked at the home after dark to see how much the light from the rec center would affect us. The whole time a dog barked from the non-villages area. I was considering a pool lot, but I decided that I did not want to hear a dog (to me was obviously an outdoor dog) bothering me into the evening. We did buy in Fenney, just not bordering non-village property.

Excessive dog barking is handled by the Wildwood Police Department. However, they cannot do anything about cows or roosters and they do exist down here. I think the roosters would be the most annoying early in the morning.

I don't recall any woods view along that stretch of 466A. I do recall pasture land with livestock to reduce the tax burden of the land owners, and an oak tree here and there.

Any home that is on the border of The Villages is not a good location. Having non Villagers on any side of a property is not ideal, in my humble opinion. You never know what you are going to get on the other side of that fence. No recourse if it becomes undesirable.

I'm going to just bite my tongue and ignore a lot of the other responses that I badly want to add my 2 cents to. I live in Fenney but not just on the other side of a fence from non-villagers. However, they are around us but have yet to be any kind of issue for us. They are people too and were likely here before we were. Being a villager or a non-villager, or being from Michigan or from Florida does not, in itself, make them a better or worse neighbor than the ones that may be living on the other side of you. It's great, as a whole, that so many people here are friendly and nice, but there are always the few exceptions and, in my view, it's not necessarily relative to which side of the fence they live on.

In my opinion, the rule of thumb to use here is buy the house that you like in the location you like. You don't get to choose your neighbors, but odds are you will have many more good ones than bad. I'd worry more about what might be on the other side of a fence 2 years from now than what is there now. Many of the properties I have seen that border or are around this area have for sale signs out and some have even sold already.

As to your question about on resentment, my bet is that quite a few aren't happy about it while others don't care or they see it as an opportunity. But I haven't seen any protesters marching in the streets or throwing things at passing cars - they keep to themselves.

As for burning trash, I can't say a non-villager hasn't done that, but I'm not seeing any evidence that it is a regular or even weekly occurrence. However, I have seen huge piles of things being burned by the developer as the area is quickly transforming into residential developments and/or supporting infrastructure.

As for dogs barking - most dogs bark and many villagers have dogs, including me. Mine happen to not bark often or much, but it's unrealistic to move anywhere here and never expect to hear dog barking.

I do hear a rooster crowing in the distance from time to time. It's not loud from my location, I can only hear it if I'm outside, and I find it, if anything, kind of charming.

We've lived here 7 months after moving down here 8 months ago with no intentions of buying this far south. We don't regret anything and have loved every minute.

If you are sincerely interested in evidence, go practice putting and chipping on the Loblolly practice greens on a Sunday afternoon.

From what we have observed, that is trash burning day for the locals.

Wrong Village, this thread is about Fenney and Desoto, no McClure.

Good point!

The kind of locals who live next to McClure are VERY different from the kind of locals that live next to Fenney.

Correct, they have more land rather than 1/2 acre lots therefore the trash burning is allowed. There are burning regulations within Wildwood and they are enforceable, only takes a phone call.

:girlneener:

Care to elaborate?

Yes, what is the difference??

I was being sarcastic when I said that.

When I was practicing at Loblolly in McClure, I noticed some neighbors burning trash. Another poster thought my comment was off-topic because it concerned neighbors of McClure whereas this topic is about neighbors of Fenney.

I guess my sarcasm did not come through. Actually, I have no idea what the neighbors are like.

Probably burning insulation off copper wiring:shocked:

We had a similar experience at Loblolly . People in adjoining neighborhood burning trash with smoke wafting over the first couple of tees. We were playing with a Villages couple who lived in the close by Village who said it goes on frequently and that they are considering moving because of the issue and frequency.

Instead of such a drastic move, they should call the Wildwood police department and ask if those particular homes are allowed to burn trash. If they are allowed not much can be done but if there is an ordinance for those homes they will contact them. That would be my first step before even considering moving.

OK, thanks for your explanation.

This solidifies the impression I had when driving to Fenny on 468.
I knew when I saw the smoke coming from a home owner along that road that I would not want to live near any of that.