New owner takes on 'big task' in DeLand's Hotel Putnam

Once again, DeLand's Hotel Putnam is in new hands.

The historic, and long vacant, property at 225 W. New York Ave. was purchased recently by Mohamed Rashad via his company, Big Bubba Investments, LLC, for $1 million.

For Rashad, who's already started cleaning up the exterior himself, it was love at first sight.

"I've renovated properties in Orlando, and I can see through all the neglect and broken windows and broken doors and all that stuff," Rashad, 39, said.

Big Bubba owns a few historic single-family homes and one commercial building in Central Florida, but he said the Putnam is the first big multi-family project Rashad taken on.

It's been several years since the Putnam has seen better days, and with the property changing hands a few times during the past decade or so and a deal with the city government falling through, officials are trying to not get their hopes too high.

"We're always optimistic that something may happen, but we kind of keep getting let down," Michael Pleus, DeLand's city manager, said.

Last June, the DeLand City Commission voted 4-1 to make a deal with Tony Collins, a Sarasota-based developer. The city would invest $500,000 over five years from its general fund upon issuance of a certificate of occupancy and the meeting of prescribed performance measures.

The commission even gave Collins a 90-day extension last August to get the financing necessary to redevelop the old hotel, but he was unable to find enough investors in time.

While Rashad doesn't want to say how much he expects to spend on renovating the property, he knows he's taking on a big job.

"It is a big task. It's challenging, but I love challenges," Rashad said. "Way bigger guys have owned it before me and nobody has done the work that I've done so far."

When Rashad first found the Putnam, he wasn't even looking for himself; he was looking for potential investment properties for a friend in New Jersey who was looking to relocate to Florida.

"It looked really good in the pictures and the price it was going for was hard to believe," Rashad said. "It's an amazing building. It just needs a lot of work."

The Orlando-based developer put $200,000 down and has a two-year balloon mortgage for the remaining $800,000, records show.

Rashad said he wants to remove portions to expand the courtyard, but he's still thinking about what exactly he wants to use the building for as a whole.

He said he likes the idea of apartments or hotel rooms, something that will give a lot of people the chance to experience staying at the historic property.

Over the years, officials have expressed support of those ideas, which also have been proposed by other developers.

"We've left the door wide open if he wants to meet with us and talk about different ideas or different ways to get there, we're always willing to meet with him," Pleus said.

Rashad said maybe the Putnam ultimately didn't make sense financially for larger development companies, but it makes sense for Big Bubba Investments, a company whose name was conjured by Rashad's trouble with remembering names, which leads him to sometimes call others "bubba."

"I know it's a big project, but I'm willing to go the extra mile to get it done," Rashad said. "This place needs somebody like me."