Your guide to Lee County neighborhoods: Estero to Gateway

Bounded by Williams Road to the south, Estero Parkway to the north, and from just east of I-75 to Estero Bay, west of U.S. 41.

Estero has surprised many longtime area realtors, including Nancy Brown, owner of Estero Bay Realty, who remembers the place as a blip between Naples and Fort Myers where the Koreshan State Historic Site is located. "Now everyone wants to live there," she says, noting that relatively recent new communities like Stoneybrook and Wildcat Run are sold out. Home to Florida Gulf Coast University, established in 1997, an outlet mall, Germain Arena and a growing number of gated communities, Estero has established itself as more than just a bedroom community for Bonita Springs to the south and Fort Myers to the north. Established communities like Country Creek have been joined by a number of newer projects, including Estero River Estates on the banks of the scenic Estero River, and the quick-to-sell-out Colonial Oaks and The Lakes of Estero near Estero High School. The Brooks, with homes from the $200,000s to more than $2 million, fronts U.S. 41-the site of a proposed new mall-and is expected to sell out this year. Across the highway are the sold-out Pelican Sound, the reinvented West Bay Club and the new high-end Hyatt Regency Coconut Point Resort and Spa.

Ben Hill Griffin has also opened up land east of I-75 to gated communities and commerce. Miromar Outlets and Germain Arena have been joined by a Publix-anchored shopping center and the communities of Grandézza and Miromar Lakes Golf & Beach Club, which boast nearly 700 acres of lakes. "It's astounding," says Brown. "All this premier property in Estero and golf courses we've never had before."

Capitalizing on its success at Stoneybrook, US Home is developing Bella Terra, a community of 1,800 single-family homes, villas, townhomes and coach homes just east on Corkscrew Road. New housing opportunities are also being created closer to U.S. 41 and the site of the new mall. Earth is moving at Wallace Homes' Rapallo at Williams Road and U.S. 41 with 400 of the 450 units sold without the first home constructed, according to McIntosh. He also reports that Shelby Homes plans a 258-coach home community, The Meadows, at U.S. 41.

FORT MYERS

Central Fort Myers

From Cortez Boulevard east to Metro Parkway and from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard south to Colonial Boulevard.

This neighborhood is a collection of historic streets, little city parks, 1950s to 1970s subdivisions, and stretches of aging, inexpensive, single-family homes, all buttressed by strip commercial centers, the Fort Myers Country Club to the north and west, and the Edison Mall just south of old Fort Myers. You'll also find City of Palms Park, the spring training home of the Boston Red Sox and the Skatium ice/inline skating rink.

Buyers in Coronado or Jefferson Park are often eager to unearth the beauty behind remodeled 1920s-era fixer-uppers, which can be found at prices starting at $250,000. "People love the thick walls, fireplaces and handmade moldings in these older homes, especially where there are so many newer homes-the old just has charm," says V.I.P. Realty's Liz Kinsey.

Some, however, find a different fate, says Dennis Rawlings, owner of Rawlings Realty. "We're starting to see older homes in neighborhoods near the Fort Myers Country Club being knocked down," he says.

East Fort Myers

East of downtown, the City of Palms stretches along the south bank of the Caloosahatchee River, Palm Beach Boulevard (S.R. 80) and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard (S.R. 82), serving up a mix of housing possibilities, from gritty and aging to new and opulent. Some of the traditionally African-American neighborhoods that form Dunbar are rising in value and welcoming gentrification. Along several Dunbar streets, residents maintain neatly landscaped homes in fine condition, boosting property values into the near-$100,000 range. Home prices in east Fort Myers range from less than $50,000 to more than $1 million. Lots will cost anywhere from less than $2,000 in and out of Dunbar to more than $300,000 on the river.

Old Fort Myers

From Manuel's Branch, west of the Edison-Ford Winter Estates to Billy's Creek, east of downtown; between the Caloosahatchee River on the north and McGregor Boulevard extending to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard on the south.

You have to wonder why it took developers so long to notice downtown Fort Myers and its vacant and underdeveloped land. Thanks to Andres Duany, the urban planner and architect cred-ited with turning around Naples' Fifth Avenue South, developers and the city of Fort Myers have committed to about a dozen new redevelopment projects-most of them 20-plus story condominiums and hotel/condominiums-announced since the plan first went public a few years ago. The first, the 22-story Beau Rivage opened last fall.

Duany's plan, calling for a combination of commercial, retail and residential development, has spawned projects that will cover a nearly 100-block area and will introduce more than 3,000 new housing units. They bear names like the Cypress Club, Hotel Monaco, Oasis, The Vue and St. Tropez. Currently in various stages of development, condo homes are priced from the $200,000s to more than $2 million, and selling fast. "There's a fascinating phenomenon going on in downtown Fort Myers," says McIntosh. "There's a huge rush to promote high-rise development."

The principals of the Cypress Club have been involved in a successful urban renewal project in West Palm Beach; their Fort Myers project will include two 32-story towers with 292 units. Located across from the city's historic district, the Cypress Club will have a contemporary façade that hides parking and offers a combination of two-story city lofts and tower units. Hotel Monaco, a mixed-use hotel-condominium complex with high-end retail, is planned for the southwest corner of First Street and Park Avenue, located near the U.S. 41 northbound bridge. Elsewhere, apartments and condos are available over many of the city's businesses, restaurants, bars, boutiques and antique shops, ideal for night owls who want to enjoy the downtown's growing nightlife.

A few blocks east of downtown, Dean Park offers a diverse collection of 1920s architectural styles, from Victorian and Colonial homes to Florida-cottage bungalows that look like they've been plucked right from Key West. Sandwiched between First and Second streets, Dean Park once attracted the city's high society but fell into disrepair. It has recently enjoyed a renaissance of sorts, discovered by do-it-yourselfers who saw potential and a prime downtown address.

West of downtown and encircled by white picket fences, the winter homes of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford stand along McGregor Boulevard, a picturesque street lined for miles with 1,800 stately royal palms. Edison Park, across the street from the inventor's home, was designed before the Great Depression by Edison's young friend, Jim Newton. Edison Park homes have always been expensive, and now run from the upper $200,000s for 1970s-era buildings that need a lot of work to multimillion-dollar estates on the river just beyond the city's first subdivision. Buyers will find a mix of architectural styles, Mediterranean, Greek revival and neoclassical, and larger yards.

"People don't mind having an older house because the lots are bigger," says Glen Smalley, an agent with Priscilla Murphy Realty. Second-generation homes are beginning to replace the original structures on property on or near the Caloosahatchee River. "People are paying up to $500,000 just for the land," says Smalley, noting that McGregor Boulevard and its side streets have become a desirable area for young professionals. "You're seeing bankers, lawyers and professionals remodeling the older homes," says Smalley.

The character of these older homes, many with trendy-again French doors and wood floors, is also attractive to buyers, says Rawlings. "Non-waterfront in really choice areas goes for about $400,000. Riverfront is another animal, $3 million and $4 million," Smalley says. "Young and middle-aged professionals want fixer-uppers and old stately homes on the river."

"Anything off McGregor Boulevard between College Parkway and downtown is a hot spot," says Kinsey. "The low end is getting higher and higher. If they don't have to move, a lot of people are staying and remolding or adding on." That's bad news for the many buyers looking for older homes, she says. "We have buyers clamoring for older," says Kinsey. "They're unique, especially for people who don't want to live in a gated community or a cookie-cutter house. They want their kids to play in the street, like they did."

Smaller, two-bedroom homes with 1,500 square feet located between U.S. 41 and McGregor, priced at $90,000 just two years ago, now sell for $150,000 to $180,000, says Kinsey. Some of the older ranch-style homes are now priced in the mid-$300,000s. Get on the river and you're looking at a whole new ball game. One 1925 home, purchased for $1.5 million and renovated, is currently listed for $7 million. Offering six bedrooms, seven bathrooms in two stories, it sits on a two-acre river lot right next to the Ford House, has seven fireplaces, a fishing pier and pool and elegant arches and bell towers.

South Fort Myers

From Colonial Boulevard south to Alico Road along both sides of U.S. 41 for several miles.

Longtime Villas resident Cindy Roberts, owner of Realty World Roberts Associates, is practically a Southwest Florida native, having arrived in 1960. She remembers when the U.S. 41/Daniels Road commu-nity was in the "boonies." Daniels was a two-lane dirt road, the upscale Bell Tower Shops were nothing more than pine trees and Ten Mile Canal was the eastern border of Fort Myers.

Now, the Villas is in the center of Fort Myers, convenient to the international airport and a mere walk to the newly opened and trendy Fresh Market grocery store in Bell Tower. Platted in the 1950s, it also has the benefit of mature landscaping and larger lots; and it lacks the cookie-cutter look of some gated communities. Stretching from Metro Parkway to U.S. 41, the 1,350-home Villas was the first planned residential neighborhood developed south of Fort Myers, and its three-bedroom, two-bathroom homes offer roughly 1,500 square feet for about $125,000 to almost $200,000 for remodeled homes. Newer, more expensive homes are also available. Neighborhood extras include a community center, 2.5-acre park and a voluntary but active homeowners association. The Villas, says Roberts, is a hot address. "My last two listings sold before I even put the signs up. They were on the MLS on Friday and I had two offers on Monday."

To the east of Metro Parkway, Plantation Road north of Daniels parallels the more commercial street, offering pockets of smaller neighborhoods mixed with industrial sites. New development is also occurring at breakneck speed along Six Mile Cypress Parkway at the eastern end of this sizable neighborhood. A stretch of public land along the parkway serves as a counterpoint to the comfortably middle-class housing that exists or is in the planning stages on the west side of the road.

To the south on U.S. 41, Hendry Creek offers two-story, 3,000-square-foot waterfront homes that com-monly list in the $500,000 range. Like much of the housing here, Hendry Creek was built on wetlands; and the shallow water accommodates only boats smaller than 25 feet. Nearby Lakes Park on Gladiolus Drive will soon have a sentry towering above it, as the twin-tower, 21-story Riva del Lago high-rises-the first Fort Myers high-rise to be built inland-is now under construction by the Armenia Group, the same developer behind the Sanibel Harbour Resort & Spa.

Nearby, The Forest Country Club offers a few remaining homesites priced at around $200,000 and condos starting in the high $100,000s. Most homes, says Brown, are priced from $700,000 to $800,000. Devonwood Estates, which has equestrian facilities and a boat launch onto Hendry Creek, offers homes from around $500,000 to more than $1 million.

Another nearby upscale preserve, Tidewater Island, includes homes starting at $500,000, with some listing at well over $1 million, built behind gates at the end of Island Park Drive, where the Mullock and Mud Creek wetlands approach Hendry Creek. Those homes have boosted the values of the 1970s-era Island Park neighborhood, which offers a mix of condos and older and newer single-family homes. Island Park condominiums priced under $100,000 are a thing of the past, says Brown. Single-family homes on the water, some with access to Estero Bay via a series of waterways, are priced at $300,000 and above. Off-water homes can still be found for under $200,000. "Island Park is so popular because it's off 41 and out of the traffic, and convenient to the water," says Brown, who describes the neighborhood's demographics as a mix of renters, young and established families, white and blue collar.