By Fred Seely
Editor
The icon stands tall in Jacksonville’s Riverside neighborhood. It has gained neighbors since it was built in 1926 but it remains the area’s best-known residence.
It’s the Park Lane, built as apartments and now 33 condos, and its signature penthouse is on the market.
And, says the listing Realtor, no one knows it better than she does - after all, she once lived one floor below.
Caroline Powell, better known as “Caro” and a Prudential agent, was showing the penthouse last month and told the client’s Realtor, “You’re in good hands. I may not know everything about real estate, but no one knows this building better than I do.”
It was Powell’s introduction to the city when she moved here from Savannah in 1950. An elderly reative lived there and she was a frequent visitor.
“It is a wonderful place,” said Powell. “I love old buildings and I love interior decorating, and a place like that really appeals to me. It’s enchanting, like the old New York City apartments. There aren’t many buildings like this. From our place on the next-to-top floor and from the penthouse, there are magnificent views in every direction.”
It sits on the river next to Memorial Park and a few yards from the busy Five Points shopping area. The park itself, with its signature sculpture, has been spiffed up by a group of historical-minded citizens and it’s now a place for families rather than the homeless.
The Park Lane’s unusual design came from the developer’s odd choice of an architect: Roy Benjamin, an Ocala man who specialized in theaters. Benjamin had designed numerous theates here. Some are now gone but still remaining are the movie houses in Five Points and San Marco. Benjamin also did one of the city’s most unusual homes, the castle-like Leon Cheek residence on River Boulevard near St. Vincent’s.
The penthouse has been through numerous tenants and owners and the latest have felt the ravages of the market downturn. After paying $450,000 in 2004 and spending at least that much in renovations over an 18-month period, the couple moved to the beach and put it up for $900,000 just as the market turned. The price has gradually gone down, the owners took it off the market for a year, and now it’s back.
“They said, ‘Rip this Band-Aid off and let it go,’” said Powell, and she and partner Allison Steilberg now list it at $350,000.
Powell and her late husband, Lee Powell, sold their Avondale home in the early ‘90’s when their kids left and moved into the Park Lane. A good friend, Evelyn Nehl, lived in the penthouse at the time. The Powells lived on the 14th floor (there is no 13th floor) for a decade before the “kid” issue returned: “Too many grandchildren, so we went back to a home in Avondale.”
Lee died in 2008 and she sold the Avondale house for a smaller place nearby.
She just turned 70 but she’ll keep selling real estate.
“I did several other things before I got into this business,” she said. “When I got my license, I really did well. Gee, I thought, why didn’t I do this before?”
She previously had run an Avondale restaurant and catering service named Carousel (remember, her name is “Caro”) and was a fundraiser for Baptist Medical Center for eight years.
An antiques lover, she became certified as a personal property appraiser and did that for seven years before she got into real estate.
“Lee closed his car dealership in the 1980’s (Powell Chrysler-Plymouth was the victim of that decade’s recession) and he ventured into real estate with Doriana Atkinson’s company in Ortega,” said Caro.
“I loved to look at houses so I gave it a whirl and wow, I was good at it! It was lucrative. Lee and I worked well together.”
She’s soldiering on at Prudential and says that widowhood and the big 7-oh won’t stop her from selling.
“I know the turf,” said Powell, “and I have a great partner.”