Buyers scarce for controversial Darrington houses

DARRINGTON — The first new residential development here in decades has been something of a tough sell.

When it was proposed years ago, neighbors objected. Now, buyers for the six homes along Highway 530 are hard to come by, and the development has turned into something of a curiosity for the nearby community.

Some might view the project as an audacious entrepreneurial enterprise, an experiment in land-use controls or a test of the limits of urban sprawl.

Even the property developers don't know exactly what they've created.

"I think we're the only ones doing anything there," said Jon Morris, the Arlington listing agent for the property known as Shadow Woods.

"Needless to say, we still haven't sold anything."

The site is, after all, about six miles west of the city limits. Darrington is a logging town nearly 100 miles from Seattle, deep in the Cascade Mountains and reachable only by a two-lane highway.

Nevertheless, that's where Earl Wheatley of Lanett, Ala., decided to build a subdivision in 1999.

Filed in February of that year, Wheatley's application to the county called for building six homes on 15.6 acres, with an average lot size of 103,900 square feet.

The Shadow Woods file includes letters of opposition from some of about 90 affected people, many of whom were concerned about the project's effect on the rural nature of the area.

Those sentiments prevail today, said Marvin Kastning, who has taught at Darrington High School since 1965 and is a board member of the Snohomish County Economic Development Council.

Kastning described land-use-control efforts dating to the 1970s that attempted to preserve the Darrington area's rural character. The intent was to allow "cluster development," he said, with cottage industries or agriculture.

'It's kind of like a wart'

Now, he said, most residents see Shadow Woods as something out of keeping with those intentions.

"I haven't heard a constructive comment about it since it started," he said. "Almost everybody in Darrington is against that little operation. People that move in there, it's kind of like a wart that doesn't belong there."

On April 17, 2000, a hearing examiner OK'd the proposal, with some conditions.

The County Council approved the project in January 2002.

Not long after that, however, Wheatley tired of the process and began looking into other possibilities. He contacted Scott Wammack, owner of Grandview Homes, and Wammack took over the development about a year ago, Morris said.

Construction began about six months ago, and now there are structures on the property, so potential buyers can visualize how the development will look when it's done, Morris said.

The question, he added, is whether the development is feasible.

"Honestly, I think we may be finding we're too far out," Morris said.

Yet he also explained that the purchase and development were carefully orchestrated to fill a potential housing niche that hadn't been recognized earlier.

Each of the six houses being offered in Shadow Woods is on a 2-½-acre lot, and most are priced around $200,000; a 1,734-square-foot, two-story house with four bedrooms, 2-1/2 bathrooms and a two-car garage is offered at $234,950.

Similar-size homes on an acre in Arlington, about 20 miles away, often go for about $250,000, Morris said.

"Our hope was the $20,000, $25,000 difference and the additional acreage would appeal to people," he said, not to mention views of the snow on the peaks.

Such hopes, of course, have formed the basis of countless developments, from buyers a century ago considering whether a home in rural Laurelhurst was too far away from Seattle to families now wondering if it's too far to drive from Marysville — or Darrington.

Retirees, families envisioned

Morris said potential Shadow Woods homebuyers may be retirees (two of the houses are ramblers with no stairs), or perhaps families with several kids who don't want to be on a "postage-stamp lot" elsewhere.

The number of homes also was important, he noted.

"With six houses, we didn't feel we'd flood the market. If it was 50, I'd say no way, but with six, I didn't feel we were pushing it."

Sales may have been hampered by weather and the absence of a finished model to show until recently, Morris added.

Morris said lots in Shadow Woods cost about $90,000 each, including sidewalks and utilities. Even with construction costs, it was hoped the development would turn a profit.

Now it's not clear that will happen, he said, and prices may have to be reduced. Or the houses might be turned into rentals with three-year adjustable-rate mortgages and held until the market reaches the area.

"In the next 60 days, that'll tell us for sure," he said.

And perhaps then there'll be an answer to the real question: Is Darrington the next Bellevue?

Peyton Whitely: 206-464-2259 or pwhitely@seattletimes.com