Setting the stage with 'bad actor'

Here’s someone you don’t know.

But you may recognize the name.

That’s Anton Van Usen at Cattle Dog’s on Friday morning, giving me all the reasons why he isn’t to blame for the nightmare known as Inverness Villages Unit 4.

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Van Usen is what I call the non-developer of Inverness Villages. Meaning, he owns vacant lots but isn’t responsible for developer stuff — roads and sewers, that kind of thing.

Right now he’s the owner of about 50 lots that aren’t going anywhere because the county has placed a freeze on building permits in IV 4. Van Usen and the county are light years apart on what should happen next.
 
He asked Commissioner Holly Davis for a one-on-one chat a few weeks ago but Davis would only meet with him if he agreed to pay for a $35,000 study to determine what’ll cost folks to pave the roads and put in drainage.

So, that didn’t happen.

Then Van Usen asked to meet with me after my Chronicle column two weeks ago wondered how someone could sell lots on a washed-out street.

That’s how our Friday morning chat came to be. We talked for nearly two hours and I learned quite a bit.

I’m saving most of it for another day because it requires some research. Van Usen has promised me emails to support his position but until that happens we’re going to stay above the surface.

A few observations:

— Van Usen is from the Netherlands where he met the original developer of Inverness Villages. I’m not sure how they knew each other but the man asked Van Usen to invest in the development. Van Usen wouldn’t do that, but he gave the man’s development company a $5.1 million mortgage.

The company, MARPAD LLC defaulted on the loan. Van Usen foreclosed and that’s how he ended up owning 325 vacant lots of Inverness Villages 4.

— Before loaning the money, Van Usen said he checked with local experts and was convinced the county was responsible for paving the roads based on a vague 1970s agreement with the original developer.

Unfortunately, a judge disagreed. Van Usen sued the county to uphold the agreement and a judge said the county may own the roads but it isn’t responsible for them. Lot owners are, she said.

— Well, guess who owned most of the lots? Van Usen assumed ownership of 370 lots in the foreclosure and started selling them.

— He showed me a document purchasers must sign that says they’re responsible for the neighborhood streets. Van Usen also claims he never spoke to any purchaser, that all those contracts have been through an Orlando real estate broker.

(Gonna say it outright: That’s a stretch.)

— I asked Van Usen what he (or his broker) told potential customers if they asked, as most normal folks would, how much it’ll cost to fix those roads and drainage. The county has wild estimates in the tens of thousands of dollars per lot owner but I’m hearing Van Usen is quoting a much smaller number.

And he is. Van Usen says customers are told a similar special assessment for paving in another part of Inverness Villages cost homeowners $6,500. Never mind that the circumstances are totally unrelated and it seems rather unlikely fixing this problem will be that inexpensive.

— Van Usen swears none of the lot purchases were sight unseen but logic suggests otherwise. I found four court cases where Van Usen is suing people for backing out of the sales contract.

The purchase prices are crazy — $35,000 to $50,000 for one lot. These are not Pine Ridge 1-acre lots. They’re standard vacant single-family lots and I cannot imagine someone dropping that kind of dime after seeing the conditions of the neighborhood first. 

— Van Usen says the county isn’t hurting him by freezing building permits because he no longer owns those lots. Fair enough, but in the other breath he acknowledges buyer interest in Inverness Villages 4 has all but dried up.

— Finally, he asks for a conversation. I don’t think that’s unfair. I realize he has a troublesome history with the county and there’s very little trust.

But what’s the harm of Commissioner Davis and County Administrator Steve Howard sitting down with Van Usen, going over the history of the development and seeing if there’s a common sense approach to solving it?

If Van Usen is a bad actor, as Davis believes, it’ll be clear. 

Then we’ll all know.

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