Back in the early 1960s, this community was known as the Pleasantville Tourist Camp. When the Atlantic City Race Course was a popular attraction, a lot of the jockeys lived there for the season. “It was called a tourist camp because it was really a vacation spot,” Robert Dolan, whose Dolan Pleasantville Associates is re-developing the area, explained.  Dolan’s father, the late Edward J. Dolan, purchased the property in 1977.

Press of Atlantic City tells MHProNews that the community is tied into the area’s history, and is leaving some of that history behind as the Atlantic City Race Course that once employed some of its residents has shut down.

Now known as Harbor Crossings, this community is transitioning into the new era of land-lease communities, with factory-made homes whose features and qualities leave the days of “mobile homes” far behind.

“We’re transforming the park, one home at a time,” Dolan said. “We’re taking one particular street within the community and redeveloping it, from one end to the other.”  While the one-at-a-time transformation takes time, it already has yielded results obvious to those familiar with the area.

“We get some people who used to live here, some coming back to purchase homes, and they’ll say, ‘I remember this place 20 years ago, and I can’t believe what you’ve done with it,’ ” he said.

New homes now available at Harbor Crossings are high-efficiency Energy Star homes manufactured by the Pine Grove Homes division of Pleasant Valley Homes of Pennsylvania. “A home can be a modular home or one piece, with two or three bedrooms and one or two baths, and range from 900 to 1,400 square feet,” Dolan said.

Now, new residents are often people who already live in the area and are looking to downsize their house and costs, “looking to live a simpler lifestyle,” he said.

Buyers choose the size and features of their homes, which are then factory-built, shipped to Harbor Crossings (sometimes in two units) and erected on a redeveloped home site with sod, landscaping and concrete driveway.  Customizing can include the room sizes, flooring, skylights, appliance packages, cabinetry and countertops.

The homes, which buyers own outright, range in price from $70,000 to $125,000, with about $90,000 typical, Dolan said. A list of companies provide financing up to 20 years on home purchases, but downsizers often just pay for the house up front.

The home sites are leased for about $545 per month, which includes city water and sewer, property taxes, and trash and recycling collection. Homeowners pay personal utilities and are required to cut the grass and maintain the landscaping.

If a homeowner moves out, they can sell the home. “They find a buyer, who makes an application to become a resident,” Dolan said. “We do a background check just like an apartment house would do.”

Manufactured homes in single sections and in multiple sections seem about equally popular in New Jersey. In 2013, of the state’s 203 new manufactured homes shipped, 110 were single-section and 93 were multi-section, according to data from the Manufactured Housing Institute.

Harbor Crossings has 190 occupied sites. It is licensed for as many as 240 sites, but Dolan said his company is focused on redeveloping the existing sites as the old “trailers” become available. ##

(Photo Credit: Press of Atlantic City)

 

Article submitted by Sandra Lane to – Daily Business News – MHProNews.