Courtyard Villas vs Ranch...How Friendly Are Your Neighbors?
 

We've just about got our home here in NJ on the market and have already been down for one LPV in July. We fell in love with The Villages and know we want to move down as soon as this is sold!! We are constantly on the Villages and MLS sites looking at preowned homes for sale. We thought we wanted a 3 bdrm Amarillo ranch but the more we look at the courtyard villas, the more we like them. Seems like much less maintenance and we do like the privacy of the fencing. But...does the fencing also make for less friendly neighbors??

So for those of you who have lived in both types of houses & neighborhoods or are currently living in a courtyard villa, tell me...did living with the fenced in yard make you feel like you didn't interact as much with your neighbors? Did you welcome that much privacy or wish that you could see your next door neighbor??

Thanks,
Pat

These are excellent questions, and as I've only lived in a ranch, I'm probably not qualified to answer-- although I know people who do love the villas.

As I see this is your first post though, I wanted to say :welcome:

Also, wish you all the best in selling your home and moving on down. There's no place like The Villages.

p.s., Do you have a dog? many with dogs like the villas as there is a fenced area for your beloved pet.

Welcome to TOTV Pat.

We live in a courtyard villa and love it. Sit out in the liani in the morning in my PJ's and bathroom enjoying my coffee .. complete privacy. The best thing is we don't have to worry about any yard maintance. Have done most the landscape in stones, with palm trees and other greenery.

We interact with our neighbors, by just stopping by and visiting with them, and they with us, plus we bump into eash other on the street coming and going. At the various club you end up joining, going to the pools, you have plenty of time to make great friends.

The only thing I would recommend if you serious about a courtyard villa make sure it has an inside laundry. Gets awfully hot doing the laundry in the garage according to my neighbors.

We live in a CYV, and Love it! As mentioned the Privacy of the fence/wall for your lanai is great, and they are VERY LOW maint. especially if you also landscape low maint, so most of our time is playing golf!
We interact with all our neighbors and remember, good fences make for good neighbors!
Plus if you have a dog like we do, it is a no brainer.

Army Guy

Another happy CYV owner we went full time in July. We have met many of our neighbor and made many new friends. Best of all is the privacy of the courtyard and low maintenance (we added a large birdcage and concreted the whole courtyard).

My dog loves it also even though we walk her along the streets to exercise both of us.

Pat:
My wife and I looked at houses for about 2 years in the Villages before we bought. During that 2 years on several trips to the TV we looked at Many Many models and loved many of them. We wound up closing on our 1685 sq ft Courtyard Villa on a corner lot with a large back yard. We had never even looked at Villas on all those trips down to TV. The weekend we saw our courtayard Villa is the weekend we bought into the Villages. We closed in July 2009 but have not yet moved down full time. The Villa section we are in I beleive "is the friendliest place on earth"! Whenever I walk out the front door my wife has to come "hunt me down" because the neighbors are so friendly we stand in the street and talk for hours? It is really amazing. The very 1st time we came down after closing we spent the weekend. By the end of that weekend I had met most of the neighbors on my block so friendliness is abundant in TV! We bought a Vinyl sided Villa with No Grass and 2 of my 3 walls in my back yard are the cement walls. Plenty of privacy and NO MAINTENANCE! It's hard to beat the Villa Life!

We got a CYV for the privacy and the low maintenance. After 11 months of pulling weeds in the backyard we just flagstoned it over. Hooray!!!

As nice as my neighbors are, when I'm sitting out on the lanai I don't really want them sitting about 10 feet away.

Our homes in the California SF Bay Area have always had small fenced in backyards; 15' - 50' deep (the small one was backed up to a 4,000 acre ranch in the hills but we still had only 15'). Gives you a feeling of privacy and allows you to pretty much put what you want in the yard without worry of others walking off with it.

Our home in TV is unfenced and on a golf course. Can't use the back yard for much, however, you get the feeling that the whole vista is yours (closest home behind us is about 100 yards away, others are 200 to 300 yards).

Both types have their advantages and disadvantages.


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I like the concept of the CYV. My biggest reason for not buying one was the 1.5 car garage. Even a 2 car garage is to small.

CYVs
 

We bought our CYV in July 2009 after many years of looking too. We actually were in the process of picking out the type of home and colors for our soon to be built home when we found a CYV that we fell in love with. CYV's aren't for eveyone's taste, but we love ours. We moved down here a month ago and are just meeting our neighbors and acknowledge that this is the friendliest hometown! Our dog loves our large backyard too as it gives him a place to run and play. We are a little disappointed in the small garage too. Somewhere in the Villages, the builders have built CYV with two car garages...have yet to see them but have been told that they exist. I would have sacrificed a little bit of our large yard to have a two car garage built.

There are villas with 2 car garages in Villa De Laguna and Villa De Laguna West. They are older, with tile roofs, block and stucco, including fences, and very near SS. Many are golf course frontage. Great location for shopping and near hospital and doctors.

There are two car garages in every villa neighborhood. It just depends on the way they do the lots. AND, there are only like 1 or 2 in each villa neighborhood.

Army Guy

im in de laguna which has tile roofs and 2 car garage. my cyv is 15 years old but i love it. have golf course/lake view only walking distance to town square and the best neighbors in the world!!!!

I live in a CYV and my neighbors are all snowbirds. Plus I believe that good fences make for good neighbors. :smiley: The closest neighbor that actually lives here is three houses down and we get along great and socialize frequently. The place to make friends is the pool. We met so many new friends there.

looks like i am marching to the tune of a different drummer - story of my life - but i don't want to look out my window or sit on my lanai and look at a wall or a fence!

spent my career working in the city - had my share of concrete there for 40 yrs! we bought our house in fl so we could enjoy the sun, the grass, the palm trees and the birds singing.

it is fun to sit on our front lanai and watch the many golf carts go by - they are each so unique. and best of all, when the neighbors go by it is a pleasure to greet them and be greeted. everyone knows that there is always a cup of coffee or tea or a cold beverage at our house...at least for the months we are there. am thinking i need to stock pet treats next...but then i'm the one who leaves cold bottles of water for my mailman when it's too hot here in jersey!