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Hoping to parlay its reputation for swanky accommodations and white-glove service, the RitzCarlton is diving in to uncharted waters on the shores of Jupiter.
Sales began this month at Atlanta-based Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co.'s first single-family home development.
The 315-acre community off Donald Ross Road will test the luxury brand's marketability in the boom-or-bust world of home building. Success in Palm Beach County could trigger more developments across the nation.
The Ritz-Carlton community in Jupiter is compromised of four synergistic prongs:
* 20 custom-designed estate homes
* 34 single-family residences
* 67 limited-ownership, detached cottages
* golf club and full-service spa.
There is no hotel, another first for the chain, which began building condos paired with its hotels in recent years.
The sales' kicker for all its for-sale products is that residents get the same pampering, services and elegance at home as they get at the hotel.
"We will have a staff on 24/7 to take care of any kind of need you might have,"said Bob Phillips, VP of Ritz-Carlton Club, the fractional ownership division. "It is one thing to be a resident of a gated community and be waved in by a rented security guard and quite another to drive into a Ritz-Carlton community to be greeted and welcomed home by our staff."
Goals set high
But applying the same service model to home owners as you do hotel guests could prove challenging, said Glenn Trotta, president of DiVosta & Co.,...