If your ship comes in, try the Bahamas
FORGET FLORIDA, forget the Costa del Sol. The cranes stand silent there. The holiday destination where it’s all happening now is the Bahamas. Baha Mar claims to be the largest resort under development in the Western Hemisphere. Scheduled for opening in late 2014, it will have 2,200 hotel rooms, spread across four major hotel brands including Rosewood Hotels & Resorts, Mondrian and Hyatt Hotels and Resorts, as well as the centrepiece, the 9,000 sq m Baha Mar Casino & Hotel. In addition, 307 private freehold residences are for sale within the hotels.
Baha Mar will also feature convention facilities with 19,000 sq m of space, portions of which can double as an entertainment and sports venue. Other amenities will include a 19,000 sq m retail and entertainment experience, combining upscale boutiques with Bahamian arts and crafts, galleries, chef-branded restaurants, nightclubs and other entertainment.
The 20 acres of beachfront has pools, groves and coves, where “docile sea animals abound”. Three spas will be set along a kilometre of the beach. And there will be an 18-hole Jack Nicklaus signature golf course.
Baha Mar will be built in a single phase, with all hotels, residences and amenities completed by the opening in late 2014. The project will be built by China Construction Americas.
Prices for The Residences at Baha Mar start at US$1.5 million (approaching £1 million), with the option of yearround personal use or being part of in Baha Mar’s rental programme, with up to 90 days’ personal use per year.
Those who rent will save approximately 25 per cent of the purchase price, due to tax waivers introduced by the Bahamian government for overseas investors — with tax-free rental revenue streams. Rental owners can also convert a portion of their personal usage for credits towards holidays at other 300 luxury resorts around the world. All owners are entitled to apply for permanent resident status in the Bahamas.
Schooner Bay, The Abacos, is a more traditional Bahamian harbour development. The 14-acre working harbour is the hub of this emerging tourism destination. It is a short flight or boat ride from Nassau and a 30- minute drive from Great Abaco’s principal town Marsh Harbour, where the international airport will open in late 2012.
The 330-acre site is being developed by Orjan Lindroth, whose thinking was not to create another Bahamian gated development, but to take a slower, more culturally attuned approach and allow the community to grow organically, with residential neighbourhoods, shops, local businesses and leisure facilities. As a result, Schooner Bay has evolved at its own pace and of the 140 plots released, 50 have sold; to both Bahamians and foreigners.
Facilities will include the Black Fly Bonefish Club, to open in March 2013; equestrian trails, tennis courts, a yachtclub, dive centre, farmers’ market, art and craft centre and a wellbeing spa.
A community of 450 homes are expected — no big brand names or grand hotels — with traditional Bahamian clapperboard exteriors, cedar shingle roofs, shuttered jalousie windows and wrap-around verandas to capture the island’s cooling breezes. Buyers can choose from a range of designs.
Prices start at £110,000 for enough land to build a two-bedroom harbour cottage to £ 1.83 million for an acre beach-front plot.