$100 million resort for Bay of Plenty

Plans for Resort Pacifica near Katikati, are being finalised - adding a hotel, swimming pools, tennis courts, bowling greens and 150 themed homes to an existing 18-hole championship golf course and clubhouse.

Developer Rocky Cribb said: "The development will set a new standard for the region with quality amenities." Mr Cribb is releasing 40-home and section packages on to the market in a week's time and will also be marketing 2500 corporate golf memberships - worth $2500 each a year for four players - to businesses in the Bay, Waikato and Auckland. He plans to build the $10 million hotel next year.

The development comes after Mr Cribb paid $4 million for the 80ha Ballantyne Golf and Country Club property in June 2001. The original developer built the course and clubhouse, which has been renamed Golf Pacifica. He completed a lot of the subdivision work and sold 40 sections before the money ran out. Only eight houses were built by the new owners.

More than 500 bondholders ploughed $8 million into the Ballantyne development and eventually received 40c in the dollar on their investment. Mr Cribb has shifted from the previous developer's original proposal of a 150-unit retirement village and recreation resort by dropping the body corporate structure and freeing up land so every property owner has a separate title.

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