The Lutgert Companies, which came to the island from Naples, Florida, before the pandemic to build the 24-home luxury Surfsedge community, is wrapping up that project now – but they like it here too much to leave.

Lutgert senior vice president Mike Hoyt said the company is looking hard for another development site, working with Dale Sorensen agent Megan Raasveldt, but hasn’t found one yet.

To “keep a toe in the market” while they continue to scour the island from inlet to inlet for land that fits their criteria, Lutgert execs have decided to branch out into custom homebuilding and high-end remodeling.

“We have put together a local team that we want to keep active,” Hoyt told Vero Beach 32963 last week. “It takes time to find good tradesmen and vendors and we have done that. Since we don’t have another subdivision project lined up, we are looking at other opportunities on the island.

“We’ve done one residential project outside of Surfsedge that turned out really well, and we own a property on Iris in Central Beach that we plan to redevelop.

“We have been going back and forth between remodeling the house for sale and tearing it down and building a spec home.”

Asking prices near $5 million for new homes in Central Beach are nudging company thinking in the spec-house direction, according to Hoyt. Lutgert picked the property up for a song before the covid real estate boom, buying it for $430,000 in 2019. The house is east of A1A on an oversize lot suitable for redevelopment. But no decision has been made.

In the meantime, the company uses the house as a kind of Vero Beach hostel/headquarters, a place for executives and specialized craftsmen to stay when they come over from Naples.

“We are in no hurry,”  Hoyt said. “If a buyer comes along who’s interested in the property, we can show them our renovation idea and they may like that. If not, we can build them a custom home, or we can build a spec.”

Lutgert does custom renovation and remodeling in Naples, often in neighborhoods it built in years past, and it is getting word out about its services in 32963 by advertising and “working with local real estate professionals we know,” according to Hoyt.

“If they come across someone who is thinking about buying a property and fixing it up, they can ask us to look at the property and meet with the client and give them our evaluation.

“We can bring a design build team if that is what a client needs or, if they have their own designer, we can execute their vision.”

Hoyt knows Lutgert is entering a competitive custom construction environment where numerous well-established, well-regarded local companies have been working for years, but the Naples firm brings its own great reputation. 

Lutgert’s  impressive roster of projects includes several of Naples signature neighborhoods, including Park Shore, an epic, trend-setting development that helped make that city what it is today.

Covering 760 acres spread along one and quarter miles of Gulf shoreline, the innovative community includes “more than 600 single-family homes and 3,590 units in 25 high-rise condominiums and several mid-rise condominiums,” according to the Park Shore Association.

Launched by company founder Raymond Lutgert  in the 1960s and finished in 2007, Park Shore was the first PUD – Planned Unit Development – in Florida and served as a successful model for many later communities.

Property there has steadily gained value, and a 6,000-square-foot home is currently listed for $15 million.

Lutgert came to Vero Beach because of Hoyt, a Vero native who grew up riding his bike across the 17th St. Bridge to surf at South Beach Park.

After graduating from Vero Beach High School and the University of Florida, where he earned a degree in building construction, Hoyt joined the Lutgert companies in the 1990s.

Lutgert was busy with big projects in Naples but at some point Hoyt began lobbying top executives to seek development opportunities on the Atlantic side of the state – specifically in his hometown.

“It took a lot of convincing,” Hoyt says. “Most people didn’t know about Vero Beach, so they were skeptical, but after I got them to come over and look around a couple of times, they said, ‘How did we not know about this place?’”

With company chairman Scott Lutgert and company president Howard Gutman onboard, Hoyt teamed up with Raasveldt and started looking for land.

After several years of effort that included a failed attempt to acquire the old Surf Club Hotel property, Raasveldt zeroed in on the Surfsedge site – 5.2 acres of surplus land owned by the Town of Indian River Shores.

Lutgert bought the property at auction for $4.4 million in 2017, drew up a subdivision plan that included 12 single-family homes and a 12-unit condo overlooking the Atlantic, got the necessary rezoning, acquired all the many permits needed for coastal construction and broke ground in August 2019 – a few months before rumors of an deadly exotic infection began to filter through mass media and infect the world’s consciousness and economy.

As much of the world ground to a halt in the COVID-19 spring of 2020, the Lutgert execs swallowed hard but pushed ahead.

“We finally felt safe to open the sales center in August 2020, but there were definitely some dog days of summer and fall,” Raasveldt said. “Through August, September and October there were many times when we saw only one or two prospective buyers in a week.

“Traffic finally started picking up in December, and as the model started getting closer and closer to completion, I could feel the energy change.”

Against the odds, the real estate market rebounded from pandemic paralysis in the late fall of 2020, launching the biggest real estate boom in history, and Lutgert was perfectly poised to ride the wave at Surfsedge.

“Once we signed the first contract, it was like dominos falling,” said Raasveldt, who sold all the available houses between Jan. 18 and mid-April 2021.

Lutgert held back one house lot at the front of the subdivision to use as a parking and staging area for contractors building the single-family homes and condo building.

“It is a tight building site, and they needed that space,” said Hoyt.

With construction of the community otherwise complete, the company is now building the final house on that lot. Hoyt said that house will be completed within the next year.

There’s no list price yet, but Raasveldt estimated it will be offered in the low- to mid-$3 million range, twice the original pre-construction starting price for some models in the community.

There are three models in the subdivision, including 1- and 2-story homes, ranging from 3,017 square feet to 3,513 square feet.

Lutgert still has one condo unit for sale, too. The beautifully designed, finished and furnished three-bedroom, three-bath, second-floor unit has 2,814 square feet of living space, 10-foot-6-inch coffered ceilings and a big ocean-view balcony with a grill. It was staged by Hazel House and the furnishings, which are not included in the list price, are available for purchase.

The residence, listed for $4,450,000, comes with a private garage with a 20-foot ceiling that could accommodate four cars with a lift and has room for a mezzanine level.

The 12 residences in the building range in size from 2,880 square feet to 3,122 square feet and were offered pre-construction for $2.5 million to $3 million.

The building includes six of the oversize garages, which were offered pre-construction for $75,000 but went up fast, benefiting from a lust for luxury garage that has swept Vero and the nation in the past several years.

“We just sold one to a resident for $400,000,” Raasveldt said.

Another highlight of the property is a unique-in-Vero, expansive rooftop club area available to all community residents, single-family and condo, which includes a hot tub, fire pit, grill and catering area, pet walk section and expansive sea views.

“That rooftop helped us sell the houses as well as the condos,” Raasveldt said.

Price appreciation in the community, which has been impressive, can be seen as a testament to the quality and appeal of Lutgert’s first Vero Beach subdivision.

A house that sold for $1,778,200 in March 2021 resold in June for $3,075,000, netting the seller a 70-percent, $1.2-million profit in 41 months.

“It is a special community,” said Raasveldt, who continues to search for another piece of land where Lutgert can add to its Vero legacy.