By Mark Sherry



Few sounds can be sweeter to the ears of Tod Hellmann and Oyvind Solvang these days than bulldozers pushing dirt and nailguns firing.
Those are the sounds one can now hear in the Village of Glenbeulah, where Hellmann and Solvang's Kettle Moraine Highlands residential development is beginning to take shape.
"I'm very pleased with what we've got going already," Hellmann said last week -from the temporary office of Hillcrest
Builders in Glenbeulah's Community Center. "There's been a lot of excitement in the community."

is from within Sheboygan County. Another interested person is from Iowa, and there seems to be significant interest from people living on the north side of Milwaukee. "I'm getting calls from people out of state," Hellmann said. "I'm getting that retired baby boomer and the young families." He said he is also getting a lot of calls from people in the City of Sheboygan looking to relocate to a quieter village with smaller schools.
A big reason for the broad appeal in Kettle Moraine Highlands is the variety of homes offered by Hillcrest Builders. It presently has nine standard plans and the developers want to add another four or five by the time the model home is finished. Plans range from ranches of 1,200 to 2,000 square feet to two story homes of 1,500 to 2,200 square feet. The plans are pre-priced so prospective owners know what their homes will cost.
Customization is also an option, such as enlarging the garage, adding a sunroom, etc. The model home, for example, is a 1,800 square foot ranch with a four-seasons room. One of the spec homes starting in June is a 1,500 square foot ranch selling in the high $150K range, while the other is 1,700 square foot two-story with a fourth bedroom left unfinished selling in the high $160K range. Hellmann said their goal is to always have two or three spec homes under construction or finished for those people who want to move right in.

Some of the lots in Kettle Moraine Highlands are suitable for exposed basements- a hot trend in homebuilding these days. The developers have also already started to improve the look of the subdivision as they recently constructed a berm and planted 50 white pine trees which are already 15- to 20-feet high. "The trees have really added to the development," Hellmann said. "The beginning of a subdivision is important," he added. "This is going to be done in a quality way with terrific architecture."
Hellmann and Solvang said they feel that by the end of this year they have at least half of the 24 lots in phase one of Kettle Moraine Highlands underway, in which case they will begin development of the 32-lot phase two. A third phase could add 27 more lots at some point in the future.