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Homestead Preserve: Historic Luxury in the Heart of Virginia’s Allegheny Mountains

February 14, 2009 by Fractional Property Ownership, Timeshare & Luxury Travel Magazine · 1 Comment

Homestead Preserve, the resort residential community adjacent to The Homestead in Hot Springs, Virginia, now offers Charter Home Club membership.

Situated in Virginia’s Allegheny Mountains in the historic resort town of Hot Springs, Homestead Preserve is a unique, conservation-based community designed to reflect the architectural heritage and preserve the natural landscape of Bath County, Virginia. This region, long known for its healing warm springs, is located on one of the last extensive pristine areas of southern Appalachian landscape in the U.S. Homestead Preserve borders both The Nature Conservancy’s Warm Springs Mountain Preserve and the George Washington National Forest.

Adjacent to The Homestead, the landmark resort established in 1766, Homestead Preserve offers all of its owners membership in The Homestead Golf and Tennis Club, giving them access to three championship golf courses, tennis, equestrian activities, spa treatments, skeet shooting, and a host of other amenities.

Homestead Preserve is located on 2,300 acres of rolling pasture, quiet woods, and wide-open vistas along the western slope of Warm Springs Mountain and in the Warm Springs Valley. The community will consist of a maximum of 450 homes at build-out on home sites ranging in size from ½ to 13 acres.

More than 150 home sites have been sold since the community launched in 2005, and to date, 19 homes have been built with more under construction. Some of these homes will be available for fractional ownership through Homestead Preserve’s newly established Charter Home Club. The Charter Home Club provides the opportunity for owners to have shared use of a newly built, fully furnished second-home residence with the purchase of a home site.

Membership in The Homestead’s Golf & Tennis Club is available to all owners. It also includes use of Homestead Preserve’s many owner amenities, among them the Old Dairy Community Center, a restored 1920s agricultural complex listed on the National Register of Historic Places that now houses a pool, spa facilities, fitness center, meeting space, and local market. Homestead Preserve recently completed construction on the first phase of its equestrian center where owners can board their horses. There are
miles of riding and hiking trails throughout the Preserve and on adjacent Homestead and Nature Conservancy land.

“Last year we conducted surveys of our prospective buyers,” says Homestead Preserve’s Director of Sales Ian McIlvaine, “and we found that over 40% of respondents didn’t plan to build at Homestead Preserve for at least five years.” Only a handful indicated they’d be ready to build immediately. Nevertheless, many of those who said they weren’t ready to build their second or retirement home right away still wanted the opportunity to enjoy the benefits of the Homestead Preserve lifestyle in the interim.

“That’s how we conceived the Charter Home Club,” explains Homestead Preserve Co-General Manager Don Killoren. “We wanted to give our buyers what they were asking for—the opportunity to own at Homestead Preserve and experience the life here without the immediate expense and challenges of building.” Many prospective buyers also said they were looking to spend less than $1.5 million. The Charter Home program offers ownership at Homestead Preserve for as little as $500,000.

The Charter Home Club is unique in the respect that it not only offers families fractional ownership in a fully furnished home and access to luxury resort amenities but also gives them a home site of their own choosing in an award-winning resort community.

Last year Homestead Preserve was named one of the Top 100 Real Estate Developments in the World by Travel & Leisure magazine. “Those who want to buy at Homestead Preserve but aren’t ready to build can get into the community now at today’s market prices, enjoy its amenities, and build later,” explains McIlvaine.
“It’s an excellent opportunity.”

Charter Home Club members will enjoy the same architecturally historic residences that other Homestead Preserve owners do. Among these residences are the community’s new antique log cabin series, the first two of which were completed this summer. Both are antique log cabins built to emulate the historic mountain style so common to Bath County, Virginia. Constructed of more than 100-year-old,reclaimed oak logs from cabins in West Virginia and Canada, these rustic cabins are rich with history.

John Airgood, who supervised construction of the two cabins, says, “They strike a chord. The houses just fit here, and they have a story.”

He couldn’t have put things more accurately. When visitors approach the first cabin near the fieldstone pumphouse at the entrance to Homestead Preserve’s Sheep Meadow neighborhood, it’s hardly noticeable. It looks as if it has always been there with its sturdy, worn logs and solid stone foundation and chimney. The home also features reclaimed oak floors, a native fieldstone fireplace and foundation, as well as a shake and standing seam metal roof.

Both antique log cabins reflect one of the primary commitments of Homestead Preserve—to build homes that blend into the landscape and history of this special region. They also remind visitors of the importance of good design, design that considers not just the people living in a home, but the environment that surrounds it.

“The antique log cabin style gives us the opportunity to pay homage to the pioneers who first settled Bath County,” says Airgood, “while also allowing us to continue our environmental commitment through reusing already existing lumber and native materials.” Homestead Preserve began exhibiting its environmental commitment long before a single home was built in the community, however. The community’s developers, Celebration Associates based out of Charlottesville, Virginia, elected to preserve the natural landscape of
the area right from the start. Of their original 11,500-acre purchase in 2002, they elected to sell 9,250 acres on and around Warm Springs Mountain to The Nature Conservancy and, in October 2004, placed an additional 935 acres into permanent conservation easements with the Virginia Outdoors Foundation.

The developers have also established a “building envelope” on each individual home site to further protect the integrity of the landscape. These actions will insure that no more than 325 acres, or less than 3% of the original 11,500-acres purchased, will ever be affected by development.

While many developers make cursory nods to conservation by putting a few dozen acres in “green space,” Celebration Associates has a long history of developing communities that demonstrate a real and lasting commitment to environmental stewardship. Celebration Associates founding partners Charles Adams and Don Killoren both made their mark on conservation development and New Urbanism, helping spawn a nationwide trend, when they led planning and design of the town of Celebration, Florida in the mid 1990s.

Currently, the partners are at work on new conservation communities up and down the East Coast, including Bundoran Farm near Charlottesville, Virginia. A 2,300-acre working farm, Bundoran will remain largely intact with over 90% of its acreage protected from development for perpetuity. Bundoran Farm is one of only 47 members worldwide of Audubon International’s Gold Signature Sanctuary Program.

Celebration Associates is also involved in the development of a mixed-use, master-planned community adjacent to the landmark Mount Washington Resort in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, where 600 acres of a 922-acre landscape will be left to the course of nature.

“We hope our communities will set an example,” says Adams, “and show that when developers emphasize preservation, they actually enhance the value of their property. We’re not only preserving natural landscapes for future generations, we’re satisfying a desire that families have to be in a place where natural heritage still has meaning.”

The historic style of the antique log cabins available through Homestead Preserve’s Charter Home Club is part of that larger picture of environmental stewardship and respect for local heritage. All of the house patterns available to Homestead Preserve property owners reflect more than four years of extensive architectural research into the design elements and styles of homes historically found in western Virginia and are outlined in Homestead Preserve’s unique Pattern Book for use by building architects, landscape architects, and contractors.

Homes of this region were typically designed with the constraints and benefits of their sites in mind, and Homestead Preserve homes demonstrate that same kind of attention to the natural landscape. They are built with materials that reflect both the native products of this region and the historic building materials of Bath County, including wood siding, stone, brick, stucco, cedar shake, and slate as well as approved composite materials that emulate the look of these natural building products. Landscaping around Homestead Preserve homes also reflects the natural heritage of Bath County by minimizing disturbance of the existing environment and featuring mainly native flora and fauna.

Four main architectural styles are visible in Homestead Preserve—Highlands Classical, Highlands Arts and Crafts, English Romantic, and Highlands Farmhouse. The antique log cabins are part of the Highlands Farmhouse portfolio.

Each time someone purchases a home or home site at Homestead Preserve, including purchase of a Charter Home Club membership, a portion of the purchase price goes to funding Homestead Preserve’s nonprofit foundation, the Virginia Hot Springs Preservation Trust. The trust provides grants for area environmental educational programs, preservation of local historic structures, and a variety of local conservation, research, and management efforts.

For more information on Homestead Preserve’s Charter Home Club or to schedule a tour, please call 877-224-9477, or visit the community online at www.homesteadpreserve.com.

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