Free new-home showcase open today, Sunday.
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Eight homes, including this house from IC Construction in The Oaks of Lake City, will be on display this weekend during the Parade of Homes. (JAMIE WACHER/Lake City Reporter)
The best of new home construction will be on display for North Florida to see this weekend.
The seventh annual free Parade of Homes will feature eight houses in Columbia and Suwannee counties today and Sunday. The Parade runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. today and noon to 4 p.m. Sunday with the homes open for the public to tour free of charge. The local builders responsible for the homes will be on site, available to answer any questions and highlight the homes’ features.
“It’s going to be beautiful weather and each of these builders has been busy putting the finishing touches on their beautiful homes, getting ready for visitors,” said Lake City Reporter Publisher Todd Wilson. “There’s a lot of excitement around this event. I hope everyone will come out and visit this free event.”
The Parade of Homes is co-produced by the Lake City Reporter and the Columbia County Builders’ Association. Lake City Title is the event’s Platinum Sponsor for the second straight year.
Bryan Zecher, the president of the Builders’ Association, said it is an event the group looks forward to each spring.
“We’re always excited for this weekend to showcase to the public new homes for potential customers to see,” said Zecher, who has a home in the Country Lake at Woodborough neighborhood at 423 NW Country Lake Drive on the tour.
“It’s great that we have eight homes for people to tour. It looks like it’s going to be a nice weekend and, hopefully, everyone will come out and get some ideas and shapes and sizes and maybe somebody will want to build a home.”
Mark Bauer and Gibraltar Contracting also has a home in the Country Lake at Woodborough neighborhood on the north side of Lake City at 641 NW Country Lake Drive.
Other builders taking part in this year’s event are IC Construction with two homes — one also on the north side of Lake City at 323 NW Old Mill Road, and the other south of town in The Oaks of Lake City at 1316 SW Mandiba Drive — and DWC Contracting with one home at 189 SW Beacon Way in the Cannon Creek Airpark community.
The other three homes are in the Eagle Point subdivision in Suwannee County off County Road 49 just east of Live Oak. GSMS Developers has two homes there, 10185 98th Pass and 10141 96th Place, and Altman Construction has one house there at 10174 96th Place.
Altman Construction and DWC Contracting are new to the event, which is also exciting, Zecher said.
“There will be some new faces, some new shapes and sizes that people will be able to view,” he added.
Silver Sponsors for the Parade include First Federal Bank, IC Construction, Trent Giebeig Construction and Tri-County Tree Service.
Rob Stewart, the owner of Lake City Title, also is excited that new builders have joined the event.
“We’re seeing a bunch of new construction homes again and seeing opportunities for people to buy new homes,” Stewart said. “It’s exciting to hear that last year’s event was so successful that we’ve got people moving to the area and building homes for the first time and existing builders continue to build homes.
“I’m happy that this event is showing results for the builders.”