History of Waterford Pointe

A former orange grove with beautiful orange trees surrounding the lakes and a pond, the site was planned to utilize the trees and water in a spacious low density development with large one acre minimum lots and much open spaces to create a suburban quiet ambiance. The new development was scheduled to open in April of 1990, with model homes by prominent master custom builders.

In the last week of December, 1989 we suffered the worst freeze in decades and lost all the trees, which were still being burned at the time of the opening in April.

Waterford Pointe looked like a desert and of course was not well received. To add to the problem, the market in 1990 to 1991 was badly overbuilt by optimistic builders, some of whom had quite a number of speculative homes in a number of developments. The market collapsed and many houses went back to the lenders who in turn sold them at distress prices. As many builders went broke, it was a decision time for developers. Options were:

1. 1.Abandon the projects and let them go back to the lender.
   
2. Hold the builders to their purchased agreements in spite of their financial problems.
2. 3. Try to weather the storm by curtailing sales and advertising costs until the market improved.

Rolls Development, Inc. rejected one and two. Decision was made to stay with three even though other developers did not. This proved to be very costly as the market did not start back until 1994. In the meanwhile, Rolls Development, Inc. spent several hundred thousand dollars for oak trees to restore the beauty of the site.

In 1994, the first Crystal Collection was held and started sales in Waterford Pointe. In 1996, the second phase was opened with another Crystal Collection and Waterford Pointe started to move well. Rolls Development, Inc. negotiated and acquired a sizable parcel of ground to the north of the original Waterford Pointe and started planning The Reserve at Waterford Pointe which was to add an additional 83 homes, opening was planned for 1999. Morrison Homes and Rutenburg Homes were to build the homes. The Expressway Authority was planning to build the Western Expressway 429 but did not advise Rolls Development, Inc. of the final route until the year of 2000 when Rolls Development, Inc. was advised of a condemnation of a portion of the northwest area for construction of the Expressway. The builders felt the Expressway negatively affected the sales of homes in the price range established in The Reserve at Waterford Pointe and wanted to reduce the price levels with lower priced lots and homes, which was rejected by Rolls Development, Inc. and the builders left the community. 

Rolls Development, Inc. attempted to negotiate a mitigation of the affect of the Expressway with the Authority in order to keep the level of homes in Waterford Pointe. However, the Authority did not agree and eventually Rolls Development, Inc. sold the undeveloped parcel to another developer, who annexed the property into Winter Garden so smaller lots and homes can be built adjacent to the Expressway.  This new development is known as Lake Roberts Landing.  In 2008 Rolls Development constructed a privacy wall along the northern boundary at no expense to the homeowners.