A few changes have been made to the plans for a new subdivision on the far southeast side of Seymour.

For one, the number of lots was reduced from 64 to 43.

Secondly, the residences will either be manufactured homes, stick-built homes or a combination of both, depending on what’s available.

Also, a park included in the original plans has been taken out.

Those details were shared by developer Joe Hauersperger during a recent Seymour Plan Commission meeting at city hall. The board approved his primary plat for the Quail Creek 2 subdivision on a 9-0 vote with Bernie Hauersperger abstaining and Gary Colglazier absent.

No one attended the meeting to speak in favor of or opposed to the request, but during the commission’s question portion of the meeting, Bret Cunningham asked Hauersperger if anything had changed since he received rezoning approval from the city in the summer of 2021.

That’s when Hauersperger said drainage issues resulted in him removing the park from the plans. That had called for a soccer field, a basketball court, playground equipment, a bicycle trail and a shelter house and would have required a homeowners association to be put in place to collect fees to maintain it.

The type of homes also was discussed.

Originally, Hauersperger said the manufactured homes would be 1,200 square feet with three bedrooms and two bathrooms and cost around $130,000, which would make more affordable housing available in Seymour. At that price point, he said there would be an $83,000-per-year property tax benefit, and it would keep people in Seymour.

The homes would be similar to stick-built homes but are manufactured, meaning they are constructed in a factory and then brought to the lot and assembled. They would be similar to homes in the Pebble Brooke subdivision to the north that was built from 1996 to 2002 and consists of 136 lots, while the Quail Creek subdivision to the east has 56 stick-built homes constructed between 2004 and 2008.

The primary differences with these homes would be the roof pitch and crawl space.

Since his initial proposal, however, Hauersperger said manufactured homes have been very popular.

“It’s going to take me longer to get manufactured homes than I may be willing to do, so we just were talking about probably coming back in and getting a blanket variance to build stick-built,” he told the plan commission. “If I have to wait 13 months to get a manufactured home, that’s not going to work for me.”

A variance would be needed because when the property was rezoned to a manufactured home district, it doesn’t allow stick-built homes, said Chad Leinart, a civil engineer for Independent Land Surveying in Brownstown.

Hauersperger said the new subdivision could have both manufactured and stick-built homes like the two nearby subdivisions.

“It’s very segregated there,” he said of Quail Creek and Pebble Brooke. “Mine probably won’t be segregated like that, but you may see both of them in there.”

Leinart said a phasing plan has been established for the new subdivision. The first phase would start and then the second and third phases would be done at the same time.

While the park was taken out of the primary plat, a stormwater detention pond remains in the plans to help with drainage.

Because of the city’s drainage ordinance, the subdivision will need a homeowners association in place to maintain the pond. While this would be a county subdivision, it falls under city governance because it’s in the 2-mile fringe.

“I would say about 75% of Quail Creek and Pebble Brooke drain into an area on the property that is depressed, but those were done before there were any drainage ordinances in place,” Leinart said.

“We’ve actually gone in above and beyond what we needed to do to meet the requirements to help out with the downstream drainage, and it works a lot better from a drainage standpoint because we’re taking that into consideration,” he said. “All of that water is coming through our pond now.”