DaRuMa Japanese Steak House & Sushi Bar, which has operated for more than 30 years in North Naples, recently sold for $10 million but the local restaurant will remain operating until next September.
The sale price is more than four times the real estate’s market value, according to Collier County property records. The county lists the land value as $2.2 million and its market value at nearly $2.5 million.
This .78-acre property at 241 Center St. is an integral piece in the center of the future One Naples redevelopment project planned by Naples-based Stock Development on the northeast corner of Vanderbilt Beach Road and Gulf Shore Drive. Vanderbilt Naples Holdings LLC, managed by Brian Stock of Stock Development, purchased the property from DaRuMa owner Lin Huei-Yi Chang, according to the deed recorded in Collier County. Chang bought the property in November 1987 for $700,000.
Tim Aten
DaRuMa Japanese Steak House & Sushi Bar, which has operated for more than 30 years in North Naples, recently sold for $10 million but the local restaurant will remain operating until next September.
After a lot of back and forth, it was in the best interest of the entire redevelopment project to buy the restaurant and allow its operators to exercise their right to operate until next fall, said Claudine Leger-Wetzel, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Stock Development. “We obviously tried to do the best we could,” she said.
DaRuMa’s footprint will become a passive park and a common area for the One Naples community, Leger-Wetzel said.
The 4,600-square-foot North Naples restaurant, operating in a structure built in 1972, was the original DaRuMa location, which now has two locations in Sarasota and one at Bell Tower Shops in south Fort Myers. The restaurants are owned by Lin Chang and her husband, Hsin-Ting “Tony” Chang, who died Oct. 17 at the age of 81. Mrs. Chang could not be reached for comment regarding the sale of the property.
Estero-based Suffolk Construction has been selected by Stock Development to construct One Naples, a resort-style community that will consist of two 12-story towers with 10 stories each of residential units, plus another three mid-rise residential buildings with five residential stories each for a total of 128 luxury residences and penthouses.
“We, hopefully, will start construction at the end of 2022,” Leger-Wetzel said. “There’s a lot of moving pieces right now.”
Pre-marketing for the 6-acre condominium project is planned for the first and second quarters of 2022, soon followed by reservations and sale contracts. A sales center for One Naples is targeted to open in March or April in a unit at the Galleria Shoppes at Vanderbilt, she said. The demolition of Beach Box Cafe and The Beach Store on that Vanderbilt Beach corner probably will occur at the end of the second quarter or early third quarter, Leger-Wetzel said.
