Saturday, October 13, 2007

Cool Project

Another great project in the Oak Park area, adding to the development energy slowly transforming that historic neighborhood back to its former self as one of Sacrament’s most livable communities.

Bob Shallit: Work finally under way on East 34th residential project
Bob Shallit - Bee Columnist
Published 12:00 am PDT Saturday, October 13, 2007


Site work is finally beginning for a new residential community on 34th Street near Highway 50 where a home giveaway earlier this year drew eager crowds and hundreds of inquiries.

Doctor-turned-developer Maurice Herbelin hoped to have his East 34th project well under way by now. But the downturn in the housing market made lenders leery.
"Since this was our first project, they wanted us to have someone with an established track record as a partner," Herbelin says.

So he teamed up with Sacramento-based New Faze Development, got a construction loan from Mechanics Bank last month and expects to have the first of 30 single-family homes completed by spring. They'll be between T Street and Truckee Way, just south of Highway 50.

"We're the project manager, and New Faze is acting as general contractor and as kind of a big brother, lending their expertise," Herbelin says.

His hope is that the project gives his firm, Trio Development Co., the experience necessary to "do the next project on our own."

What's become of the one home and three duplexes that occupied Herbelin's property? Since April when they were offered free to anyone willing to haul them away, all but one have been relocated to new sites, he reports. The last one is sitting on a trailer and scheduled to be moved today to a vacant parcel in south Sacramento.