Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I can't believe one homeowner was foolish enough to "lend" the development group half a million dollars to build the road to his driveway! Bet he'll never see that money again I hope Buncombe County pulls their bond and gets some of the roads developed for the people who do live there already.
Yep, just dumping cash on it won't help. What got me was that they only needed $157K to finish the road--guess they had a good time with the $500K. Also interesting that out of 220 lots sold only 15 houses built out there! These mountain land developments have really been a fiasco for WNC. I guess there are some that panned out but the weak ones are really showing the problems. The good thing is that Buncombe had the sense to require a completion bond. So if they call the bond does that also mean the company will have to declare bankruptcy--certainly they won't get a free ride!
The headline in todays Black Mtn News section of ACT reads "The Settings of Black Mountain forced to discount lots". Looks like they've got a fire sale going on folks to stave off the creditors. Now's your chance to pick up a $1.6 million dollar lot for only $600K. Of course you probably won't be able to drive up to it unless you're willing to lend then enough money to finish the reads in there.
I well remember the glory days of 2005 when my wife and I had a deposit on a lot at The Settings. We visited their sales office where there was a whiteboard showing all of the Phase I lots. Each one of the lot numbers had the lucky new owners' names and states of residence marked next to it. FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, FL, Fl, FL.
I asked the sales rep how many of those people had actually seen their new property before making a deposit. Answer: 10%. A helicopter clattered overhead as the next round of prospects were taken on a aerial tour of the development and its surroundings. A few weeks later a little bird told me that all of the locals who had reserved lots at The Settings had cancelled their reservations and so did I, the next day. I'm not from FL. It happened all over WNC, and lots of other places, back in the day.
The reason they used a helicopter for tours of the property--because there were no roads and many still haven't been built. You would think that folks taking those tours would have put 2 and 2 together but greed is a very powerful inducement and blinds folks to realities. How much you want to bet that a bunch of those lots were paid for with second mortgages on over-valued properties in FL?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I hope Buncombe County pulls their bond and gets some of the roads developed for the people who do live there already.
More on the Settings
That's about the only risk I'd take on that mess. Do you think they'll take my offer? 
