- May 21, 2025
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SimplyDwell Homes, a Lakewood Ranch homebuilder owned by Neal Communities, has completed a seven-house project on a lot once occupied by abandoned homes in Sarasota.
The project was meant to be a new step for the company, taking dilapidated properties in urban markets and building lower priced houses for entry-level buyers. The idea was that it would provide attainable, newly constructed houses for residents, mostly renters and first-time home buyers that were affordable.
But its experience dealing with the city of Sarasota rules and regulations proved to be a tough one and, for now, SimplyDwell’s president says it’s stepping back and focusing on building the larger suburban communities where its model has worked since the company was founded two years ago. (City officials deny the issues SimplyDwell alleges..)
“We’d love to do it again. We just want more support from the municipalities and the cities,” says Jag Rupnarain. “But we would love to do it again.”
The seven houses are on North Orange Avenue in the Amaryllis Park neighborhood, across from Booker High School and south of Newtown.
SimplyDwell describes what was there before as “vacant and neglected properties in disrepair.”
It paid, according to Sarasota County property records, $360,000 for the lot at 3480 N. Orange Ave. July 2023. The company then divided it into the seven lots, spending $600,000 to make sure it complied with city standards.
They were able to build seven houses over the course of a couple of years. But the process took far longer than expected, delays that were costly and frustrating, says Rupnarain.
SimplyDwell’s business model is fairly straightforward, focused on efficiency.
What it builds are houses designed to cost less than more traditional homes. That means houses, from 1,300 square feet to about 2,500 square feet, priced from the high $200,000s to the high $300,000s. (According to the real estate website Redfin, the median sale price in the Sarasota housing market is $529,900, up 10.4% from a year ago.)
Rupnarain, whose background is in attainable housing, say it is able to keep prices low by focusing, in part, on the payment required for buyers when purchasing the home.
For example, if buyers in one of its communities can only afford a $150 per month homeowner’s association fee, there is no use putting in a community swimming pool or other amenities that will raise that cost to $250 per month or higher, especially since those costs only go up over time as features need more maintenance.
It also keeps costs low by simplifying its supply chain.
Rupnarain insists the homes SimplyDwell builds are of the same quality and specifications one would expect from a higher end builder — Mohawk flooring, MasterBrand cabinets, Kohler fixtures and LG appliances.
Yet while another builder may buy 10 different window sizes, SimplyDwell will buy five. Instead of offering “a bunch of different door sizes,” Rupnarain says it keeps its selection to four, maybe five. And it limits the color options of cabinets.
And it can leverage the efficiencies brought by being part of Neal Communities — one of the largest homebuilders in Florida, with $905 million in revenue in 2024.
“Through value engineering and simplification, we’re able to offer a better price point,” Rupnarain says. “We try to understand what our buyers can afford then deliver what they can afford and what they need.”
In addition to the seven houses in Sarasota, SimplyDwell built Broadleaf, a 266-house community in Parrish and has four other planned communities in the works.
Sarasota city officials disagree with SimplyDwell’s portrayal, saying its process is as efficient as it can be and that it is transparent about how it goes about its business.
“City staff is available to provide a pre-application meeting to discuss the permitting/inspection process, potential issues and timelines and what to expect with inspections,” Sarasota spokesperson Jan Thornburg says in an email.
“The city’s permitting staff regularly receives overwhelmingly positive approval ratings from customer surveys and unsolicited emails, which mention staff’s efficiency, knowledge, professionalism.”
But given SimplyDwell’s business model delays are costly and can make an affordable project cost prohibitive, says Rupnarain.
“Through past experience," he says, "we’ve learned what works and what doesn't work and what needs to happen to make it work well.”
One of his complaints — which also illustrates how the city and a developer can be at cross purposes — is a fight over a golden trumpet tree on the property.
Golden trumpet trees have bright yellow leaves and can grow as high as 35 feet. This particular one, says Rupnarain, was half dead.
The tree needed to be removed so crews could bulldoze the buildings on the property, but the builder needed a permit to cut it down. While it waited for the permit, crews were forced to work around the tree.
“It's just little things that happen that make it difficult to do business in certain areas,” he says.
Thornburg counters that while the city supports attainable housing, it also needs to maintain and grow trees. It’s a matter of sustainability.
“Tree mitigation, including viable options provided by the city’s professional arborists to protect healthy trees, is part of the process to protect the urban canopy, which reduces the heat island effect, filters the air, provides wildlife habitat, beautifies the area and more,” she says.
Rupnarain detailed the company’s interaction with the city in an interview with the Business Observer in early May and provided an undated letter to city officials along with a detailed three-page, single-spaced timeline.
The timeline details, in minute detail, the process the company went through, starting with engaging the seller on Feb. 4, 2023 through July 8, 2024, with a notation about administrative review notes.
Some of the entries note common happenings. Others note delays, including permits the company claims took too long. Much of it appears to chronicle the development process as it works in the real world.
One issue brought up in the letter is the enforcement of design standards in the Newtown Historic Conservation Overlay District, which began Aug. 8, 2023.
Rupnarain writes that five of the company’s seven building permits were submitted after the start date: two on Aug. 10th and three on Aug. 25th. “Nowhere in this process was our team made aware of a change in enforcement that would affect the majority of our project,” the company writes in its letter.
The timeline shows that the issue was resolved Oct. 16, 2023, when SimplyDwell was notified that its project was “grandfathered in.”
Two days later, the timeline states that “three demo permits still pending; city well inspector on vacation.” The following day, Oct. 19, 2023, the timeline simply states, “notice of demo permit release.”
Thornburg, also in detail, defends the city’s actions and attention to the project writing “many times a representative was not available on site to address building inspection issues.”
She says the first plumbing underground inspection on Aug. 8, 2024, failed because sewer and water lines were covered. And that a “strong drive structural wood screw” was used on truss tie downs. The screws, she says, require precision to meet the manufacturer’s specifications and were not installed correctly, resulting in the failed inspections.
While it may not be unusual for developers and local officials to be at odds — or even in conflict — there is little doubt Sarasota residents need attainable housing and SimplyDwell was, and is, primed to provide some options.
All but one of the seven houses on North Orange Avenue have sold. It is a two-bedroom, two-bath 1,312-square-foot one-story house with a two-car garage. In a market where the median home sale price is $529,900, it is priced at $348,999.
But there is also the reality that municipalities have rules and regulations which must be followed. There are infrastructure concerns with drainage and utilities that must be addressed when building a new community and trusses must meet the specific standards set by the Florida Building Code. Trees, too, play a major role both in sustainability and community character.
Could there be a happy medium?
Maybe. But for now at least, Rupnarain says the company will look for a better fit when and if it next undertakes to build a smaller, urban project on a derelict property.
“We have the resources and the experience in developing land and finding the right locations and … we're able to do things that, sometimes, are a little bit more difficult than other people want to get into,” he says. “It just gets to be a losing proposition if we don't have city support and municipality support.”
