Investors Pay $10M for 210 Acres Outside Phoenix

TerraWest Communities and JEN Partners have paid $10 million for 210 acres of land outside Phoenix, with plans to build up to 1,000 homes.

The locally based developer and New York-based private equity real estate fund plunked down cash for the land near 219th Avenue and Sun Valley Parkway, in Surprise, about 30 miles northwest of Phoenix, the Phoenix Business Journal reported.

The seller was an affiliate of Wayne R. Moretti, who had zoned the property in 2005 for a master-planned development of 1,200 homes that never broke ground.

The deal works out to $47,619 per acre. Broker Paul Clark of AZ Trident Group handled the sale.

Michael Jesberger, principal of TerraWest, told the newspaper he plans to rezone the property for between 750 and 1,000 homes, with 20 to 30 acres targeted for a large shopping center and other commercial uses.

Jesberger expects to have the land rezoned, then break ground and begin selling lots by late next year. He said the property, in the shadow of the White Tank Mountains, would serve as the entrance to the Surprise Foothills, an emerging submarket outside Phoenix.

“It is the only property in Surprise that has frontage on the Sun Valley Parkway,” Jesberger told the Business Journal.

The area has already drawn national developers, including Miami-based Lennar, which bought 309 acres within another new master-planned community called Surprise Foothills, less than two miles away.

That 1,043-acre master-planned community is being developed by an unidentified firm led by Elliott D. Pollack, CEO of Elliott D. Pollack & Company, based in Scottsdale.

Lennar, which in January became the first home builder to buy land at Surprise Foothills, plans to build 846 homes at the site, according to the Business Journal.

Other developers to flood the zone with homes include Scottsdale-based Meritage Homes and Irvine, Calif.-based New Home, Jesberger said.

Howard Hughes Holdings, based in Texas, is developing Teravalis, a 37,000-acre master-planned community in Buckeye, about 30 miles southwest of Surprise. Its first village will contain homes by seven home builders, according to the newspaper.

— Dana Bartholomew