April 21, 2020
YOUR BRETTON WOODS UPDATE
I hope this e-mail finds you and your families doing well in these unusual times. Notwithstanding the Coronavirus impediments my staff, engineers, architects and K. Hovnanian Homes’ staff are proceeding at full speed. 

THE REGION'S NEW HOME MARKETPLACE

Across the region, and for that matter across California and beyond, new home sales have plummeted. As you can imagine, national builders are worried that the Coronavirus situation might linger on for months leaving them with unsold inventory and lots. Most have frozen or cancelled pending land purchases including builders in the Sacramento region. To date, K. Hovnanian (KHOV), the master builder for Bretton Woods, has not hesitated on our transaction.
 
What makes Bretton Woods very interesting to K. Hovnanian in these unprecedented times is your commitment to purchasing a new home. No other community in the region has the same situation to offer national builders. 

Currently, we have nearly 300 buyers (mostly couples) who have signed our “commitment” forms. Ultimately, I expect these circumstances will encourage the KHOV headquarters in New Jersey to allocate the funds to close escrow and commence construction this summer. 

I’m preparing a more direct strategy to demonstrate what other projects will be unable to prove, namely Bretton Woods in Davis has buyers ready, willing and able to purchase homes. More details about how we implement that plan in about two weeks.

While we’ve lost some weeks primarily due to the virus’ impacts on the City staff, not us, we are proceeding as if nothing has changed and are still focused on starting infrastructure by mid to late Summer. Plenty of obstacles to overcome, but like a proverbial bulldozer, we are pushing forward. 

The biggest struggle is encouraging (really pleading with) the City/County staff to match our commitment. At our urging the City has hired, at our cost, an outside consultant to take over the City’s planning process and manage its review. Heidi Tschudin, a seasoned planner, starts this week.
POSITIVE NEWS
FLOOD PLAIN REMOVAL
Bretton Woods has received FEMA’s Conditional Letter of Flood Map Revision (CLOMR) two months earlier than anticipated. 

The importance is that once the infrastructure is installed and certified by the City, Bretton Woods will no longer be in the flood plain and more importantly our homes not be subject to flooding or flood insurance.

The ”flooding” which you saw in February 2019 that severely impacted the Sutter-Davis hospital site is actually excess runoff from ag land drainage from an area of 12 square miles west of Davis. It is primarily excess drainage from ag lands located between Russell Blvd. and Covell Blvd. to the west of Stonegate. 

The excess runoff grows deeper as more accumulates moving easterly.
The new Bretton Woods channel will collect that water flow and direct it into an expanded City detention pond located along John Jones Road. Eventually, it goes under the freeway to the North Davis Channel at Sycamore Lane.
ART & POETRY TRAIL UPDATE
Along the western and northern edge of the neighborhood we have the 100-125 ft. wide channel/oak forest and an additional 50 ft. wide landscaped path lined with shade trees and dwarf fruit trees of various varieties. You can see it on the site map on our website.  Go to www.brettonwoodsdavis.com/location/
 
Interspersed on the path’s edge facing the channel are 10 art nodes where sculptures created primarily by California artists will be located. There are also benches and picnic tables planned for each node for evening/wine, sunset viewing, just thinking, or resting as you walk the ¾ mile long path. In addition to sculptures, there will be poetry placards lining the path related to the art.
 
Our New York-based art consultant has received 120 separate artists’ submittals. Examples are now on the Bretton Woods website. Click here to view.

As the “in-house art expert,” I will be making the final decisions based on our art consultant’s thoughts and recommendations. At the end of the day, you can blame me for the choices. Eventually there will be a request for Bretton Woods’ residents to act as docents to lead tours for Davis’ schools. If you are interested please let me know.
“Public art is part of the fabric of what makes Davis such a special place to call home and we wanted to infuse this spirt into Bretton Woods. These sculptures will help define our unique art and poetry trail and inspire both residents and visitors to the new neighborhood.”

- Dave Taormino
TELEMEDICINE AT BRETTON WOODS
Thanks to the late Bob Chason, former UCD Medical Center Director, our planning four years ago for telemedicine facilities and related technology has, with the pandemic, become a new normal for doctors and patients. 

Bob convinced me to include telemedicine facilities in our neighborhood with access available for each homeowner, as well as, a dedicated office space within the Activity and Wellness Center. This telemedicine space will be state-of-the-art with specialized lighting to maximize its efficacy for numerous medical specialties. 

Bob deserves the sole credit for this Bretton Woods enhancement. Dr. Tom Nesbitt of UCD, a friend of Bob and Wendy Chason, has taken up the telemedicine cause as well.
THE COMMUNITY LINEAR ORCHARD
We’ll have primarily dwarf varieties of fruit trees. I expect to setup a long-term relationship with the UCD Ag Department, Yolo Food Bank and the HOA for joint care of the fruit trees and sharing the harvest with Bretton Woods' residents and Yolo Food Bank. This will provide fruit for Bretton Woods' residents and the most needy families in our county as well as reducing operating costs for the HOA.

If you have ag experience or are just interested, let me know.
THE BEAUTY OF STREET TREES
Uniformly the City designates the varieties of street trees. Developers and residents are not given the choice or opportunity for input. In Bretton Woods' case, we are selecting the street trees. 

Considerations include spring and fall color, shade, and visually breaking up the view of asphalt and concrete. We see the street landscaping as another opportunity for adding interest and beauty to the streetscape.
NEW GREENWAY HOME PLANS
For various lifestyle needs, committed and prospective buyers have shown an interest in home designs ranging around 1,400 square feet.

At this time, the slightly smaller Bungalow homes are oversubscribed, so we are introducing two alternative Greenway home plans. Both of these homes are near the square footage of the Bungalows, but will be offered solely on Greenway homesites. These are posted on our website for viewing as well.
1400 sq. ft. GREENWAY HOME
  • Single story homes
  • 2 bedroom, 2.5 baths, 1/2 den/office with private patio, 2 car garage
  • Finished floors and cabinets. Solar panels, great room - kitchen combination. Private yard in rear of home, front door faces fully landscaped greenway with walking path; HOA cares for front landscaping. Side yard private patio off great room. Front patio off Greenway; similar to Bungalow and Cottage style.
  • No caregiver option above the garage.
  • Estimated price: $595,000 - $625,000
1434 sq. ft. GREENWAY HOME
  • Single story homes
  • 2 bedroom, 2.5 baths, full den/office, 2 car garage
  • Finished floors and cabinets. Solar panels, great room - kitchen combination. Fenced private yard in rear of home, front door faces fully landscaped greenway with walking path; HOA cares for front landscaping. Side yard private patio off great room. Front patio off Greenway.
  • No caregiver option above the garage.
  • Estimated price: $615,000-$635,000
CONCEPTUAL HOMESITE EXHIBITS
We have just completed a full set of conceptual homesite exhibits for each home style at Bretton Woods. You can view the full scale set and an updated site plan on our website.
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ARTICLES YOU MAY FIND INTERESTING
The Bretton Woods Group stays current on trends, discussions, research and newsworthy information beneficial to the active adult and senior lifestyle. Here we like to share some of the most recent articles we have found interesting and thought you might as well.