Pat Neal and Nathan Cross have a couple things in common.
1.They both are home builders.
2.They both are participating in the Parade of Homes, which starts today and continues through March 6 as the Manatee-Sarasota Building Industry Association’s main marketing event of the year.
Home builder Nathan Cross at his Parade of Homes model in Nokomis. He and his family also live in the house. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 2-16-2016.
That is about it. Pat Neal has been building here since the early 1970s, has a large company, and more than 10,000 residential units on his building tally. He also is one of the most prominent developers in the state. Neal is a household name in the region’s substantial building economy.
Nathan Cross, on the other hand, is participating in his first local Parade of Homes, and he has exactly one house in his Sarasota record, at 805 Hollowood Circle off Laurel Road in Nokomis. It is among the 110 model houses entered in the Parade, and Nathan Cross hopes to become
a household name here.
Cross has had his own small building company, NWC Construction, since 2000, but moved his family from Orlando to Sarasota last year because it’s a better place to raise children, he said.
In Orlando, he won multiple Aurora Awards and also built The New Southern Home for the Southeast Building Conference.
Nathan Cross' model in the Parade of Homes has a glass-tile backsplash in the kitchen. Note that the power outlets are mounted to the underside of the upper cabinets so as to not interrupt the backsplash surface. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 2-16-2016.
The Cross house is at the end of a dirt-and-shell country lane just to the west of Laurel-Nokomis School on Laurel Road. He built a lot of it himself, in just four months. He says he treated the project as someone else’s house, in order to get it done in time for the Parade of Homes. Otherwise, it might have taken a year.
Cross is “a high-end, true custom builder,” happy doing only a dozen houses a year. “We don’t own any land and we don’t want to own any land,” he said. “We built to suit individual needs. We’ve never built the same house twice, and our goal is to create what, hopefully, is a perfect home for them. Our job is to bring dreams to fruition.”
He prides himself on high-quality construction with top-flight materials.
“I don’t want my clients to like me for one day, or one week,” he said.
“I want them to love me for the rest of their lives.”
John Cannon Homes' Kiah model on Grove Street in Sarasota is featured on teh 2016 Parade of Homes. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 2-16-2016.
Cross, who builds houses to sustainable “green” standards, also does remodeling; in fact, he prefers it. He said he has the ability to look at a tired old house and envision what it could become — something that meets the clients’ needs and appears to be entirely new.
“Some contractors are ‘upgraders’ — they take out the old cabinets and floors and put in new ones,” he said. “I’m a remodeler.” His least-expensive recent project had a budget of $250,000.
Cross is the exception in the Parade of Homes, where much larger companies know the drill. Neal Communities and its subsidiary, Neal Signature Homes, has 22 models in the parade. John Cannon Homes, Todd Johnston Homes and Lee Wetherington Homes have been around for decades and have multiple models ready for the event.
The parade’s roster of 110 models is up from 93 a year ago as the local building industry continues to rebound from the Great Recession. Judges will be touring the models today and awarding prizes for best kitchen, best exterior, best overall and the like in the various price categories.
Among subcontractors, 40 pools are entered in the judging.
London Bay Homes' Isabella-Two Story model at The Founders Club in Sarasota is among 110 model homes in the 2016 Parade of Homes. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 2-16-2016.
The Parade of Homes also has eight subdivisions in its Best Communities category, including mammoth Lakewood Ranch and high-end The Concession, and two that are being built atop what had been golf courses at one time. Surrounded by decades-old residential structures, they are The Enclave at Forest Lakes in Sarasota and Mirabella at Village Green in Bradenton.
Models are open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays. The Cross house, called Hawks Nest, is open on weekends only.
Information is online at ParadeofHomesInfo.com. Parade of Homes magazines were distributed in Friday’s Herald-Tribune and are available at the newspaper and in the parade models and sales centers.
