Business

Dionne Rose, Business Reporter

Having had some difficulties getting at least one previous Trelawny housing development off its hands, local housing developer Kemtek Development and Construction Limited will be spending up J$8 billion building more homes in that parish.

The roughly 800 two-bedroom units at Florence Hall, near the recently built stadium, will be done over several phases, the company's spokesperson said.

Kemtek's director of operations, Garwin Tulloch, said the135-acre development, aimed at the lower spectrum of the housing market, would be done in four phases with the first 200 units estimated to cost $2 billion.

The development is called Stonebrook Vista.

"Infrastructure works started in April but we are well advanced in construction," he said.

The first set of houses, to be sold for $6.6 million each, should be completed by late November or early December, Tulloch said. Buyers are required to pay a five per cent deposit upfront, plus closing cost.

The units are about 850 square feet in size.

National Commercial Bank Jamaica, the Jamaica Mortgage Bank and the National Housing Trust (NHT) are providing financing for the project, said Tulloch, although he declined to quantify the funds being put up by the government-run housing agencies.

It is understood that negotiations are still under way with NHT.

This is the second Trelawny development for the 20-year-old Kemtek.

In 2008, the company placed 152 new homes at Stonebrook Estate on the market. Tulloch said all those units, priced at $6.5 million, were sold.

But the sale of the units was slow due mainly to the global economic downturn.

That experience notwithstanding, Tulloch is convinced that this time around, sale of the homes will be brisk.

affordable homes

"I think we are coming out of the recession (and) there is still a demand for this market," he noted.

He added that with the NHT offering $4.5 million mortgages to individual contributors, the Florence Hall homes were quite affordable.

"With a combined pool of $9 million, our units are below," he said.

While Tulloch said sales of the units so far have been encouraging, he was not prepared to disclose how many homes have actually been sold so far.

"Based on sales, we are doing way better than how we were doing when we started the other project," he said.

The new development, which loops the Trelawny Multi-purpose Stadium, is being marketed as containing stone-coated roofing, ceramic tiles, solid surface kitchen countertops, solid wood cabinets and high ceilings.

Kemtek has done other developments such as Emerald Estate town houses in St Mary, Keystone Phase Two in St Catherine, Stilwell Mews in St Andrew and Greenwich Estate at Drax Hall in St Ann.

dionne.rose@gleanerjm.com

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