Years ago, they flocked by the hundreds to the roadside stand known as Schramm's Turkey Farm, elbowing into the main building the day before Thanksgiving to pick up their freshly killed holiday bird.
Today, there isn't a turkey in sight -- unless you count the cupola, where an iron figurine is perched upon the welcoming gatehouse to Farmington Village, a new development that has people hurrying back to the old Schramm Farm for a different reason.
What was once a Pasadena landmark -- bordered by Mountain Road, Catherine Avenue and Routes 100 and 648 -- has evolved into one of the hottest-selling developments this year in the Baltimore metropolitan region.
Since its opening in February, the community of townhouses and single-family detached homes has been selling at a quicker monthly pace than any other development in the region, according to Meyers Housing Data Reports, a publication that tracks and analyzes new-home construction.
Faster than Owings Mills New Town in Baltimore County.
Faster than Piney Orchard, Seven Oaks or South River Colony in Anne Arundel County.
Faster than Spenceola Farms and Harford Town in Harford County.
At Farmington Village -- with 171 units sold of a planned 428 -- it's not silly to say that buyers are gobbling them up.
"We hit the market with exactly what people were looking for at the right time," said developer Gary Koch, whose company -- Koch Homes -- is building 119 single-family homes. Joining Koch is Ryan Homes, with 86 single-family homes; Ryland Homes, 85 townhouses; and Grayson Homes, 50 single-family and 107 townhouses.
"There really is no other community in this area -- I mean northern Anne Arundel County -- that offers anything comparable to what we are offering," Koch said.
But the success that the development has been enjoying can only be tempered by seeing why there is a Farmington Village at all.
Tucked in the northern sector of the development is a 20-acre parcel with a barn and a new five-bedroom, five-bathroom nondescript home -- the Schramm residence. It's what the family kept of the 213-acre farm after it was sold to Koch in 1993.
The matriarch -- Evelyn, 93, lives there with her children Louis, 72, William, 71, Emma, 70, and a cousin, also named Evelyn, 53.
"It has taken 13 people over three generations and the sale of the farm to get this house," said Emma Schramm. "We could not build this house with over what we made farming. It had to take the sale of this farm, the money from the farm to build it."
The Schramms never envisioned selling the farm, which came from land purchased by Emma Schramm's grandfather in 1909. She spoke fondly of how he first tried to farm vegetables and raise and sell flowers before the family turned to raising turkeys in 1944. In fact, there was a real disdain for real estate people and developers.
"I just say that it takes a good farmer to tell a real estate man to go jump in a lake, when you could earn more in interest than you can make on farming," she said in a 1991 interview with The Sun.
At that time, the Schramms were in the process of taking their farm out of the Arminger Agricultural Land Preservation District, which they had joined in 1980.
They made the decision after realizing that their finances would be devastated because of estate taxes. As each sibling died off, the others would have to carry the tax burden. To protect themselves, they had to sacrifice the farm.
"It would have cost $250,000 in taxes when the first one died," Emma Schramm said in a recent interview. "That would only be on one-quarter of the property. Then the next time it would have been more and when the last one died, someone would have had to pay on the whole thing. So you could have paid out more in taxes than what the place was worth."
After the County Council passed a bill in August 1991 allowing the Schramms to withdraw the farm from the preservation district, there was talk of the county purchasing the site for a criminal detention center. When that was rejected, a golf course was considered, but that notion also died.
That kind of talk and stress "scared us enough" that Emma Schramm let it be known the family wanted to sell, and they got a real estate agent to contact Koch.
"We figured this would be the best for the community," Emma Schramm said. "I don't think they wanted a jail and I don't think they wanted [subsidized] housing so I consider we did the community a favor [although] a lot of people don't think so."
Koch did all of his negotiating with Emma Schramm, who, he said, was "very tough but very fair."
"We were both good to our word," Koch said. "You always felt you could be totally forthright with her and she felt the same way with us.
"I think in the beginning there was a lot of concern as to what was going to be built. And I think after she got comfortable with us and what we were going to do, she then had a comfort level and was then able to allay lot of concerns and fears about what would happen.
"There were always people who would come to the old fruit stand and say to her, 'Oh gosh, I hope you never sell the farm.' But I think she'd say, 'Well, that's fine, assuming you'd be willing to pay our estate taxes.' "
Community support
A deal was done, but it would take almost six years before they were able to break ground. In an area with more than 1,400 homes within a half-mile radius of the farm, residents were concerned that the new development would overcrowd schools and strain the sewer and water systems.
But Koch dedicated 15 acres for school development and built a sewage pumping station to serve the community.
"We had gone out initially and had approached a lot of the adjoining communities to describe what we were going to do before we ever went in for the rezoning, and really had their support first," Koch said. "We knew if we didn't have the support and the understanding of what we were going to do, then they would come out and voice their objections."
Kathy Grammo, who in 1992 was on the board of directors of Aspen Park, a townhouse community across the street from the Schramm Farm, listened to Koch's presentation.
"They [the board] didn't have any problem with it. They thought it was a good alternative for all this land, [and] I thought it was a great thing to do with this property," Grammo said, adding that the school site and a planned day-care center was key.
"I felt that they were giving back to the community," she said. "In my eyes at least, it wasn't all money-making. He was bettering Anne Arundel County as a whole, which is what he is known for."
Grammo, a cardiac sonographer at Franklin Square Hospital Center, was impressed and soon began to investigate other Koch communities. Her husband, Michael, a supervisor at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, had lived in a Koch home, and the more she saw, the more she liked.
The Grammos decided that they wanted to move from their townhouse to a single-family detached home. The Koch communities she had visited didn't have the logistics that suited her, but she kept her eye on what was happening across the street.
"I watched as they were developing the land, and I kept riding by and riding by, and I kept thinking that they have to be opening up some land here soon," Mrs. Grammo said. "I called my Realtor and said, 'Why don't you give them a call, it looks pretty good inside there.' "
She was able to get a more detailed look at the cul-de-sacs that Koch was planning, and when the first signs went up at the site in December, the Grammos -- with their two young sons -- became the first to buy a Koch home in the development, a $279,000 four-bedroom home.
The Grammos fit the profile of buyers Koch sees for Farmington Village. Koch's strength is in Anne Arundel County, and he sees this project as attracting families and first-time buyers who are already living nearby.
"We assumed the majority of people who were going to purchase were from the immediate area or from northern [Anne Arundel] County," Koch said. "And we knew that the majority of )) people -- from the demographics -- were going to be first-time buyers who might be interested in the townhouses or buyers with young families.
"Buyers who were living here in some of the previously built larger communities, such as Chesterfield, Aspen Park, would be interested in moving up from those units to a larger single-family."
Koch picked the builders who would join him in the project based on their ability to deliver those kinds of homes at prices that would let them sell rapidly.
Ryland's townhouses have an average sale price of $125,681, according to Meyers Housing Data Reports. Grayson's townhouses go for a bit more at $126,566.
As for the detached single-family homes, Ryan's average price is at $193,250, while Grayson comes in at $219,435 and Koch is at $243,500.
And sales have been going so well that Koch, who predicted in 1994 that the community would be done by 2008, says he expects to be wrapped up by 2004. Of the 192 townhouses being built, 84 are under contract. And almost half of Ryan's single-family homes have been sold.
The key to the Farmington Village success is very simple, according to Fritzi Hallock, who did the marketing studies for Koch back in the early 1990s while working for Legg Mason Realty Group.
'It's smart growth'
"The demand was strong and it was all local market. It was wonderful. It gave people who grew up in Pasadena the opportunity to remain in that area and buy a new house," said Hallock, who now has her own consulting firm in Owings Mills.
"If you wanted to move up to a new single-family house, the only place that they were building were on very small lots [in Pasadena] at a price point [that was the same as for] area townhouses, so it was not a move up. You were forced into the Glen Burnie, Severna Park area which is not [Pasadena].
"[Farmington Village] has that critical mass, but what makes it so surprising and so remarkable is that it is doing it on a local level and not a regional level," she said.
Hallock also noted that the project, despite its tree-lined perimeter and its rural flavor, is really an "infill" project, meaning it's built among existing residential and commercial properties.
"It is also smart growth," she said. "You have development all around it. It is an infill piece in its purest definition. It just happens to be a really big one. It was basically begging to be developed.
"This [Pasadena] is a densely developed area. It should be a continuation of that. Certainly, wouldn't you rather be willing to build this project here than in southern Anne Arundel County?
"So it made great sense. It is perfectly positioned to capture those people who are living in that market it is catering to the best of them rather than the worst of them. So many times they say, 'Ugh, this is Pasadena' and you know what, there is some money there. There are people who want to spend it.
"Just because you get a little more wealth and you want to move up to a single-family home, why should you have to leave your neighborhood? Especially if you want to stay. There is a lot to be said for the location."
Said Mrs. Grammo: "There are a lot of different things they could have done with this land, and I think people should appreciate what Gary [Koch] has done in developing this into this kind of community. I think this betters the Pasadena area."
Pub Date: 11/22/98