Even though Del Webb Corp. has yet to sell a single home at its first cold-weather retirement community in Huntley, the company that made its mark building developments in more temperate climes is now searching for another site in the North.
“If we didn’t think it was a success, we wouldn’t be spending a lot of money researching a new cold-weather site,” Del Webb Chairman and CEO Philip Dion said.
Dion said Huntley’s Sun City retirement community, with more than 5,000 homes slated to be built over the next decade, had already received 13,000 inquiries from prospective buyers. That interest, he said, convinced Del Webb to begin planning another cold-weather community.
The new site could be in the Chicago area, right next to the Sun City in Huntley, or in another northern metropolitan area, Dion said.
He was in the Chicago area for a gathering of Del Webb officials and local dignitaries at the June 30 official groundbreaking at the Huntley Sun City site.
Del Webb construction crews have about 10 percent of the site-preparation work completed for the first phase of the project. It will take the company 10 to 12 years to complete the Huntley project, eventually providing homes to about 8,000 retirees.
Like its warm-weather counterparts, the local Sun City will attract active retirees with such amenities as a golf course, 20-acre lake and recreation center.
Del Webb already has Sun City communities in Arizona; Las Vegas; Georgetown, Texas; Hilton Head, S.C.; and Palm Springs and Roseville, Calif.
Coming to Huntley was not a decision made lightly by the company. The board of directors was skeptical about a snowbound Sun City, to say the least, Dion said.
“The toughest thing was for our management team to take a bold step and recommend to our board (we build in Huntley),” Dion said. “That this was a calculated, organized and planned effort and that it was not a dream of the CEO who grew up in Chicago.”
It will probably take the development company nine months to a year to decide on the next cold-weather site, Dion said. Another site in the Chicago area, or even a twin site in the Huntley area, would not be without precedent. Near Phoenix, Del Webb has three retirement communities abutting each other.
Even if the company settles on a site in a year, the new project would still be several years behind the Huntley Sun City project.
Sun City will complete model homes and begin selling this fall. Residents, at least one of whom in each household must be 55 or older, will begin moving in next spring, according to Del Webb’s timetable. A small sales center has opened in the nearby Huntley Factory Shops.
Del Webb has been building age-restricted communities since 1960, but the trend has heated up in recent years with the graying of the Baby Boom generation.
The retirement community development sits on 1,850 acres on the northwest corner of Illinois Highway 47 and Interstate Highway 90. The property has been annexed by Huntley, with about two-thirds of the property in Kane County and the rest in McHenry County.
Del Webb became interested in the Chicago area about five years ago when market research revealed that most retirees want to stay close to their hometown.
Local officials have been accommodating to the project since the beginning, primarily because they saw demographics they liked. They hope to increase tax revenues from seniors, who won’t put added pressure on public schools, as younger home buyers do.
