Today we’d like to introduce you to Tony Green.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Tony . So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
When I was a teenager, my father began inviting me to walk land with him not time in an office. He was a homebuilder and he would take me with him when he was looking at new land. As we walked through the woods he would ask me, “where’s the house”? Here we were in the middle of the woods surrounded by trees and nature and ‘there were no houses,” yet he was asking me – “where’s the house”? What he was really asking me, and what he really wanted me to think about was, “where should the house be”?
What my dad was really trying to impart to me was – vision. Basically –“what will the people who live in this house see”? Where is the best place to build in terms of views and privacy? I have taken this simple piece of learning and applied it to my job today at The Pinehills. I have spent a lot of time climbing trees to see the view that a house will see. What will the homeowners see every day from their deck? Are there enough trees on either side to allow for privacy. The only real way to answer the question of what does the house see is to walk the land. We walk land with that in mind as we create the home-site. We ask our builders to walk the land so they can determine what each room in the house they are designing and building will see. The value we create is directly related to how good is the view we find.
In 1996, on the way to a meeting with the Cape Cod Commission, Steve Karp of New England Development mentioned to my father that he had been invited to look at 3000 acres in Plymouth, MA that was available. But since it was only zoned for large lot 3-acre single family building my father didn’t think it could work out. When he told me I said, “3,000 acres and you didn’t even want to look?” I went anyway …and all I saw was opportunity. And I saw the future. In fact, the land was so spectacular, I saw a variety of futures. I was smitten. A conceptual overlay zone existed in the zoning code, but had never been applied.
That began the process of creating The Pinehills. Our goal was to create an old style town on the 3,000 acres that is now The Pinehills. The zoning overlay was extremely complicated allowing use of 30% of the land for building and 70% for open space and recreation. It took us quite some time to untangle all of it. 220 public meetings. But we did. As it turned out, we received zoning permission for exactly what we had envisioned – a mixed use village center with retail office and housing allowed together;, recreation, open space and of course, the ability to choose where to build homes that would overlook that open space: woods water, golf, even ocean views. The process was long, and involved meetings with the Planning Board, Selectmen and many sit-downs with residents and neighbors from the town of Plymouth. We also wanted to hear from the people who might want to live or work here to understand what they wanted so we could then determine if we could be permitted to do that.
We hosted several focus groups with people who had been calling us to find out what the plans were for all that land. We brought them together and asked them just two questions. 1) what do you do when you’re doing what you don’t HAVE to do? and 2) What is your idea of home and neighborhood? Those answers, given to us back in 1999, helped shape The Pinehills of today 18 years later. 3000 acres – of which remain open space – more than 2,000 homes – a thriving town center with retail and office – a specialty market, great restaurants, award-winning golf courses, walking trails, community clubs – and of course, Mirbeau Inn & Spa.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
From the first day I walked the land back in 1996, to the day we opened The Pinehills with seven model homes ready for viewing, four years had passed. During those four years, I feel like we may have met and had coffee with every person that lived in Plymouth at that time…or certainly close to it! We held meetings with residents, with abutters, with the Planning Board, with the Selectmen, with State agencies…well, you get the picture. We needed to assure everyone that we were careful listeners and that they could trust us to understand what was important to them.
For those many years, we were in full negotiation mode and without all of those meetings, without all of those cups of coffee we would not have The Pinehills today. We made many commitments that enabled us to build and we have kept them to this day — including the creation of a 350 acre nature preserve and the promise to keep 2/3 of the 3,000 acres we purchased as open space. In essence, our first obstacle is what almost every developer deals with – the community itself and all of its governing boards as well as of course the people who live in the area. You can imagine the smiles on our faces when we welcomed our first residents, Pepper and Pat Martin in June 2001. We were finally open for business! But then….
We hadn’t been open a year when tragedy struck the United States on September 11, 2001. After our collective weeks of mourning, we sat down and tried to gauge the impact of 9/11, on our industry as a whole and on The Pinehills. We, like so many, simply could not see anything positive coming from this tragedy. And then something pretty amazing happened. More and more people started to come to The Pinehills. 9/11 created a sense of “What am I waiting for?” “Why not now?” Those things that people were putting off – taking a vacation, starting a new career, starting a family, selling that old house that’s just too big….”What am I waiting for?” We started seeing people coming to The Pinehills ready to start a new life, ready for new neighbors…ready for community.
In 2006 though prices went up, sales volume was down, and before the recession hit in ’07, we made the strategic decision to instruct our homebuilders to stop building “spec” homes. Only build for a buyer. That way we would not have inventory just sitting there during a tough economic time. In addition, this was a great time for both The Pinehills and our builders to re-examine the types of homes that were being built. And to our builder’s credit, they listened and began developing smaller, cozier, less expensive homes. Our cottage homes were born! This allowed us to reach new market segments and what we call our “front porch neighborhoods” were created. By the time things got bad in October of 2007, virtually all of our inventory was gone.
In 2008, we added the one thing that we had been hearing that we were missing at The Pinehills. A great specialty grocery. We created The Market at The Pinehills and it is a tremendous success story. Named the first Healthy Market on the South Shore, it draws from well beyond the community and has established itself as one of the best markets, if not the best, south of Boston.
Then in 2009, opportunity knocked, and we answered. HGTV had scouted The Pinehills and decided that we would be the ideal site for the creation of the 2010 HGTV Green Home. We drew thousands of people to view the home, received a tremendous amount of media coverage and felt like with the opening of the Green Home, we were officially back! The recession of course affected us as it did so many, but we were still able to sell nearly 100 homes a year back then, and we would never complain about that!
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about The Pinehills – what should we know?
We look at what we do at The Pinehills as more than building homes and neighborhoods — we are in the business of creating community. We create opportunities for people to bump into each other and socialize. For example, we built the Post Office in a central location on our Village Green so that people would have to go there to get their mail and would inevitably meet each other. We had heard from so many in our focus groups that being part of a community, having friends…was so important. We knew we had to bring that to life. Another good example is the Stonebridge Club where residents participate in one of the many clubs that are offered here…from kayaking to wine tasting to book clubs. All of the clubs, by the way, are started by residents. We have a lot of skilled, passionate residents!
We also believe that food builds community. We have the Blueberry Muffin, a great place to grab coffee and breakfast, Mama Mia’s, a beloved Italian restaurant, a farm-to-table tavern turned restaurant called Rye Tavern and of course Mirbeau Inn & Spa with its Bistro and outdoor bar/cafe area with a large pizza oven. And of course The Market. If you don’t know someone well, you will know them a heckuva lot better after sharing a meal with them. The Pinehills believes in food as a community builder.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
We respond to the changing home needs of the people who are looking to live somewhere new. We will have more choices. We now have 11 builders and offer everything from luxury apartments to townhomes to condominiums to cottages to over 55 neighborhoods to single family and custom homes. We now offer Flex Cottage living which is basically a home with a lower level with its own entrance and driveway. Can be used let’s say for a family and a returning college student needing his/her own space. Or the second space can be an office with its own entrance. Flex living is for multi-generations or for work/live.
Pricing:
- Homes at The Pinehills range from $400,000 to $2.8 million.
- Rents begin at $2,000/month
Contact Info:
- Address: 33 Summerhouse Drive
Plymouth, MA 02360 - Website: www.pinehills.com
- Phone: (508) 209-2000
- Email: info@pinehills.com
- Facebook: Facebook.com/thepinehills
- Twitter: @ThePinehills
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