When 3,100 Square Feet Isn’t Enough : Moorpark: Owners of large homes in Tuscany tract don’t want smaller houses nearby. Builder says the soft market makes them necessary.
Owners of enormous homes in Moorpark’s Tuscany tract are protesting a developer’s plan to build merely large homes in the neighborhood, fretting that the smaller structures will erode property values.
The homeowners recently asked the City Council to block developer Urban West Communities’ plans to finish the Tuscany tract with new models that they say are far inferior to their own.
“They’re 35% smaller,” sniffed Chuck Fuhr, the owner of a 4,100-square-foot house from the first batch of homes constructed by Urban West. “These additions are not on the other side of a neighborhood.” Some of them, he pointed out, are very close to the existing larger houses.
Initially, the Tuscany tract built 50 homes ranging in size from 3,642 to 4,118 square feet, each with at least four bedrooms and three baths. The largest houses have five bedrooms and four baths.
But with the depressed real estate market for luxury homes, Urban West has scaled back the size of its newest models.
The 130 new houses will offer only 2,348 to 3,100 square feet of living space. The larger model in the new offering has five bedrooms and 3 1/2 baths. The smallest has a mere four bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths.
“That’s a very nice home,” said Harvey Gandel, past president of the Simi Valley-Moorpark Assn. of Realtors. “If you look at the older houses in Simi Valley, they’re like 1,100 or 1,200 square feet. My house is 2,200 square feet, and that’s large.”
Gandel said he understands the desire of homeowners to protect their property values. He just questions to what extent the developer can harm those values by building houses with three-car garages and four bedrooms.
“He’s not building little Cracker Jack boxes,” Gandel said. “He’s not building a slum.”
But a vocal group of Tuscany homeowners are asking the City Council to step in and prevent Urban West from discontinuing the larger homes in favor of the smaller ones.
At issue is whether going with smaller models violates one of the conditions under which the original homes were sold: Namely that no new models smaller than 2,913 square feet would be built in Tuscany.
The council has yet to set up a meeting with Urban West and the homeowners. But on Wednesday the council will consider the group’s request to send a second representative to any meeting. So far, Fuhr is the homeowners’ only representative.
Moorpark Mayor Paul Lawrason, who lives in a four-bedroom, three-bath house with 2,700 square feet of living space, said there is probably little the city can do to keep Urban West from shifting to the smaller models.
“It seems to me that it’s strictly a problem between the parties, the homeowners and Urban West, to try to resolve,” Lawrason said. “Do we have to be the referee? I guess we do.”
Urban West Vice President Tom Zanic said that he understands the homeowners’ frustrations, but that his company is doing the best it can to meet the challenges of a changing real estate market.
“I think what some people are experiencing is the downturn in California real estate and that is something that they’re trying to deal with,” Zanic said. “We are making changes in the models, changes that will keep the community alive and vital.”
Zanic said he believes that the homeowners are better off if Urban West can build the rest of the project’s houses and sell them, rather than leaving the existing houses surrounded by vacant lots.
The Tuscany residents also complained that Urban West wasn’t up front about its plans for the neighborhood, securing city approvals last year to add the smaller models without telling anyone it planned to discontinue the larger ones.
“There was never a guarantee on what would or would not be built in the area,” Zanic said. “Business conditions have changed to the point that we can no longer sell the large models.”
When the first four Tuscany models opened in September, 1990, the large models were priced between $389,990 and $489,900, Zanic said. Asking prices for the same homes now range from $356,500 and $390,500--evidence of the declining market cited by Urban West to justify the smaller models.
Zanic has declined to say what the projected asking prices are for the smaller models.
On a recent afternoon, Tuscany resident Lori Rutter stood outside her 3,800-square-foot home and pointed into the distance with anger and dread.
“Over there,” she said, “you can see the chimneys of the new models.
“They’re distinctly smaller,” Rutter said of the new homes. “The bedrooms are smaller than the smallest bedroom in the original Tuscanys. They’ve eliminated some features, like double French doors. Most of these don’t even have a double front door.”
