COURTESY : Ocala Star Banner
BY FRANK STANFIELD
Posted on July11, 2004

THE VILLAGES - Traffic was bunched up at a traffic light on County Road 466 on a recent afternoon, as if hunkered down beneath the dark, summertime thunderstorm clouds.

But not for long.

As soon as the light changed, the cars and a host of contractors’ pickups sped off, as if propelled by a rocket launcher.

The sound of thunder cracked, and bolts of lightning slashed the sky as rain began to pour. But an army of construction workers kept on working — even on rooftops — and golfers kept driving, putting, hacking and slashing their way down the fairways.

 

Nothing, it seems, stops or even slows The Villages growth machine. About 40,000 souls call the active-55-and-older gated community home. That’s an impressive jump from the 1970s, when it was a modest, sleepy place of 400 mobile homes on U.S. 441/27. But as the "Florida Crackers" who once raised cattle and watermelons on the land would have said, "You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.’’ By the year 2014, the machine will have built 32,000 more homes. The construction logistics alone are staggering. It’s like a perfectly choreographed dance. Everything has to be coordinated between government and contractors and subcontractors, and everything has to be done in sequence, from plans to permits and from slabs to rooftops. "We are moving 100,000 yards of material each day, six days a week,’’ Ted Graham of the Graham Brothers Construction earth-moving company said in an interview with Baum Publications, which produces a series of trade magazines. "We have to stay six months ahead of the unit guys. That means all major

Hoses are lined up in this aerial photo of The Villages off County road 466. By the year 2014, The villages will have built 32,000 more homes.

infrastructures — water retention ponds and liners, sewer, water, storm, roads graded in and golf courses. We’re building a whole city here,’’ he said in the story posted on baumpub.com.

It takes only about 90 days, from the time a homeowner signs on the dotted line to the time he can move in, said Terry Yoder, the owner of T & D Concrete, a company that has grown from one employee — Yoder himself — to 500 in 20 years.

Construction crews wouldn’t be working so furiously if newcomers weren’t beating a path to the community that has spilled over into three counties — Lake, Marion and Sumter.

How does The Villages do it? Those familiar with the massive development say the answer lies in marketing, execution, innovative financing and a vision of self-contained comfort communicated to residents through its newspaper, cable channel and radio station.

 

MARKETING SUCCESS Its success has been rooted in marketing from the time Harold Schwartz of Michigan took over the old Orange Blossom Gardens mobile home park and asked his advertising executive son, Gary Morse, to join him. Soon, the development began selling itself through advertisements. Some ads were aimed at retirees in "Modern Maturity’’ and, later, "My Generation,’’ a magazine aimed at the growing number of Baby Boomers. Those magazines have

Golf carts travel on Main Street at The Villages Square, Thursday evening , The Villages, FL USA

now been rolled into one — "AARP The Magazine’’ — though The Villages has not run any advertisements in the organization’s magazine for some time.

This year, The Villages hosted the nationally televised the Gridiron Classic college all-star game played on its polo field. That brought a lot of exposure, not only during the game, but in TV spots during other bowl games.

But if ads have been a lure, the real bait has been golf, first with a string of "executive’’ golf courses, and more recently a pair of championship golf courses, one designed by golfing legend Nancy Lopez and another by Arnold Palmer.

It seemed only natural, then, to advertise during golf tournaments on TV.

"I heard about it (The Villages) in an advertisement during the Disney Classic,’’ said resident Doug Anderson.

Others heard about the development through other marketing tools.

Joan Stys learned of a promotional videotape from a co-worker in Tennessee and asked the woman to lend it to her.

"My husband didn’t believe it at first,’’ Sty said of the images of retirees living it up in the sun. "He thought they were all actors.’’

The couple eventually took the plunge.

"We love every minute of it,’’ she said.

Barbara Kunz had a similar experience, including taking a tour of the Disney-like Villages commercial square in a bus made up to look like a trolley car.

"There was no pressure whatsoever,’’ she said of the sales pitch.

William J. Burgess Jr. heard about The Villages from a friend of a friend in New Jersey. He, too, took the tour, including being put up at a motel and given a fist full of "funny money,’’ as he called it, or scrip that can be used in such places as Villages restaurants, a micro-brewery or bowling alley.

One of the draws for him was its location. He likes both salt and freshwater fishing and The Villages is centrally located between the two coasts. Plus, there is the ever-present golf.

And it is the experience shared by Burgess, Stys and others that really has led to The Villages' success, because they are spreading the word to friends and relatives.
A referral is the best kind of marketing, said Dan Laemont, director of marketing for rival Pringle Development in Lake County.

Once upon a time, The Villages sold 400 homes a year. If 25 percent of the new homeowners talked to friends and family about moving in, that's 100 new customers, and they're basically "pre-sold,'' Laemont said.

The more homes that are built, say 2,000, the more referrals there are.

"When you get to a certain level, growth begets growth,'' Laemont said. Pringle has sold about 5,000 retirement homes in Lake County and is about to start a new 1,000-home project in Mount Dora.

Some Villages residents, like Stephen W. Fuller, who wanted to escape the harsh winters of Indianapolis, discovered the developer’s Web site while touring another city.

The site, thevillages.com, is very thorough, including home plans and prices, and even listings for "preowned’’ mobile homes in the original Orange Blossom Gardens section, ranging from $56,000 to $235,000. Most of the mobile homes seem to be in the $90,000 range.

There’s something for everyone’s budget, the Web site says, including "premium’’ homes in the $300,000 or $400,000 range, or "villas,’’ small 2-bedroom units going from $120,000 to $138,000, and everything between.

EXECUTION
"They build a good, sound home,’’ Yoder said.

Sumter County’s building official agrees.

"People are critical, saying they build them too fast. That’s not the case,’’ said Harold "Skip’’ Lukert.

The Villages uses six home builders: Dodd McDowell Construction, Hess Construction, West Construction, Murray Construction, Lambert Construction and James Cichielo. They often build the same homes over and over again. And they know it’s easier to do it right the first time than to have to tear something apart to start over again, Lukert said.

If inspectors find a problem, the contractor fixes it immediately, Lukert said, because their marching orders are to "keep on going.’’

Consumers seem happy with their work. An extensive look at court records shows surprisingly few lawsuits of any kind, even the "slip and fall’’ variety that tend to plague grocery stores and other retailers. Most of the suits that have been filed appear to be foreclosures.

H. Gary Morse, who became chief executive officer of The Villages when he took over from his father several years ago, not surprisingly had an upbeat take on the reason for the company’s success in a 2001 interview with "Florida Trend.’’

"We’re not necessarily selling homes. We’re selling happiness,’’ he said.

More specifically, The Villages is selling the idea of a lifestyle in "Florida’s Friendliest Hometown,’’ where the vacation never ends.

"Virtually every convenience our residents need on a day-to-day basis can be found in The Villages and all are a golf cart ride away,’’ its Web site proclaims.

Its appeal crosses the Atlantic. Besides the sales center in The Villages, the company also maintains a sales office in London.

Prospective homeowners are shown floor plans and models, and are whisked into sales centers where they pick out swatches of carpet, counter tops and all the rest. "They buy without ever seeing the house,’’ said Ronnie Hawkins, Sumter County’s tax appraiser.

What they do see is a clean, orderly community with carefully tended flower beds, manicured lawns and dazzling sunshine.

CONTROL
In fact, the developer has control over many facets of everyday life - from the Spanish-themed architecture and faux historical look of the sidewalks to deed restrictions and whether you can paint your driveway to the news most residents read and the long-term debt they incur to live there.

And the developer flexes powerful political muscles in Washington, Tallahassee and locally.

One of the top Republican fund-raisers for President George W. Bush in 2000, CEO Gary Morse is working hard for the GOP again, including hosting a Mel Martinez rally in his Senate bid.

When officials at The Villages Regional Hospital wanted more beds for its 60-bed hospital, they picked up the phone and got some special legislation making it exempt from the lengthy, uncertain certificate of need process, and Gov. Jeb Bush signed the bill.

In Sumter County, the developer is apparently working behind the scenes to change the way county commissioners are elected. One Sumter, as the initiative is called, would allow at-large elections if voters approve the idea in the Aug. 31 primary.

Politics is not just an abstract idea. It's personal, according to Sumter County Commissioner Jim Roberts. He has been depicted in a "Villages Daily Sun'' editorial as a public official who views Villagers as "suckers'' and has been lampooned in cartoons. His stands on various issues have been mischaracterized in stories and headlines, he says.

Once a regular little newspaper, it became part of the development's publicity machine when Gary Morse assumed more control over operation of the development, according to a former staffer who does not want to be identified for this story.

Things like getting both sides of a story, for example, became less important than presenting the developer's point of view.

The transition makes business sense, though readers should be aware of the inevitable conflict of interest, said a faculty member at Poynter Institute.

"Media ownership is a problem for everyone," said Kelly McBride, who teaches ethics at the nationally known, independent, nonprofit school for journalists.

"Every media outlet is owned by someone,'' she said. "The best is the hands-off owner. ''

Media companies are set up to report the news and have unique management structures.

"You would not expect to see the chairman of the board of Gannett (which publishes USA Today and a large number of daily newspapers) to be in the newsroom telling people what stories to cover or what stories to avoid,'' she said.

A developer-owned newspaper would tend to be different. McBride gave a hypothetical example to make her point: if the development had a problem with inadequate fire hydrants it would be unlikely the company newspaper would report on the issue.

"It's like those newsletters you get with your insurance bill. You don't really expect that to be the place to go to get good information about problems in the insurance industry or prescription drugs,'' she said.

"It's not as if the company has set up a town to mimic democracy, but something else,'' McBride said. "And that's fine — everybody goes in voluntarily. But it would be unrealistic for people to expect a newspaper in a company town to be journalistic. It would be more like public relations.''

The Star-Banner made an attempt to get the Villages' side of the story for this article. Editors at the "Daily Sun'' said they could not comment, and Publisher Phil Markward could not be reached for comment.

On another front, the developer can call on a demonstration of people power. When a citizens' group began challenging The Villages permit applications, contractors and employees staged large-scale pro-growth rallies to let elected officials know they would be in trouble at the ballot box if they didn't see things their way.

Much of the developer's control goes unnoticed. One contractor likened it to Disney World, where security, maintenance, even such mundane things as trash pickup are hidden from park guests.

Many residents like the controls.

"It's part of what you're paying for,'' said one retiree. "It protects your property values.''

INNOVATIVE FINANCING
A key to The Villages success is the way it has financed millions of dollars worth of infrastructure by creating community development districts that float tax-free bond issues.

That's how the developer built its first commercial district, the Villages Town Center in the early 1990s.

"No one else had really done that,'' said Jay Thompson, division president at rival Del Webb Spruce Creek development of 2,200 homes. "That took vision and courage.''

It allowed the community to grow rapidly, and the bigger it got the bigger it got, with more and more residents telling their friends and family members.

"It's a snowball effect,'' Thompson said.

"It's a money machine,'' said Kenneth Colen with the rival Marion County development On Top Of The World.

Residents must pay off that debt through a series of fees; and during the early, critical years they have no say-so over the makeup of the district boards, which seems to come as a surprise to some people, despite the information being included in their sales contract.

When bond issues go before a circuit judge for mandatory approval, some residents show up to voice their objections, but the law limits judges, basically, to checking legal papers to make sure the i's are dotted the t's crossed.

Judges like Mark Hill in Tavares politely allow the would-be protesters to speak out but give them no illusion about being able to actually change things.

Some complain about a recent fee increase to play golf. "I'll tell them, well, don't play golf on that course,'' Hill said. "I'm sorry, there's nothing I can do.''

Sometimes retirees, noted for being careful with money, suddenly do baffling things.

"A lot of people who retire don't research a place, they just go and buy it,'' said Susan Lampman with the Claude Pepper Institute on Aging & Public Policy at Florida State University.

''Buyers have to go in with their eyes open,'' said Scott Siemens, vice president of Ocala Trophy, which is developing the Heath Brook development in Marion County.

Community Development Districts are neither good nor bad, he said. It's just a different way of doing things.

"The buyer gets more for his money up front and will pay more over a longer period of time for that,'' Siemens said. His company has not used CDDs to date.

Siemens, whose company has plans for 1 million square feet of commercial space and 2,500 homes on State Road 200, calls The Villages a nationally renowned "if not a world renowned'' development.

"The fact that they are located here, doing what they're doing, validates Central Florida as a destination for people who are retiring,'' he said.

SURPRISES
But if some residents say they were surprised by the fees and bond debts, others have been pleasantly surprised.

Doug Anderson, for example, met his wife, Janet Gray, in The Villages.

"Janet wanted to start a new life. I wanted to start a new life. We met each other and started a new life together,’’ he said.

Still others were surprised to learn that things change.

"It’s getting a little crowded,’’ Burgess said. "It should have been kept a secret. I told seven or eight people about it, so I’m to blame.’