Platted and under site work. No pricing, no plans, nothing listed.

DiMare Farms, recorded as Vista DiRoma: 733 new homesites coming to Apollo Beach

DiMare Farms is an approved community of up to 750 single family homes and townhomes on about 228 acres of the old DiMare tomato farm in Apollo Beach, in unincorporated Hillsborough County. A final plat covering the first two phases recorded in the summer of 2026, two state stormwater permits were issued during 2025, site work has been under way since the spring, and 733 residential addresses are assigned across eleven streets. No home has been permitted, no homesite sold, and no pricing, floor plans or opening date released.

This community has two real names. It is commonly called DiMare Farms, after the farm, and that is the name on the homebuilder's plan material. Vista DiRoma is the name on the recorded plat, the name of the community development district, and the name going up on the entry monuments. Neither is confirmed as final, and communities get renamed at launch. If you have heard one and not the other, it is the same 228 acres.

Get notified when pricing and plans are released for DiMare Farms.

What is on record, and what has not been released

On record

• A recorded final plat covering phases one and two, from the summer of 2026, which is what creates sellable homesites.
• A third phase has been addressed, but its plat has not recorded.
• A rezoning to a planned development, approved in mid 2024, for up to 750 homes.
• Two state stormwater permits issued during 2025, for the subdivision and the amenity center.
• Two recorded notices of commencement naming site work contractors.
• 733 county assigned residential addresses, plus a clubhouse and mail kiosk.
• Lennar Homes is the homebuilder named on the approved plan and the applicant of record on the rezoning. The land is owned by a land banking company, named as developer on the plat.
• A community development district, with an assessment lien on the land and validated bonds.

Not released

• Pricing, for any plan or any homesite.
• Floor plans, square footages, elevations or renderings.
• The district assessment amount per home.
• Association dues, budget or governing documents.
• An opening date, a model, a sales center or a delivery schedule.
• The final retail name, and school attendance zones for these addresses.

Details on this page are compiled from public entitlement records and are targets, not commitments. Pricing, floor plans, home counts, and timing have not been released by the builder and are subject to change without notice.

Subdiview is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Lennar Homes. Lennar Homes and its community names are trademarks of their respective owners and are used here for identification only. All community information is compiled from public records and is subject to change.

Get notified the week any of those unreleased items lands.

What is actually approved here

The approval allows up to 750 homes at a little over three per acre, one of the larger single neighborhood approvals in south Hillsborough County, and 733 residential addresses are already assigned across three phases.

It will not be all detached houses, and that is written into the approval rather than left to the builder. A condition requires that at least a quarter of the homes be fee simple townhomes. Fee simple matters: you own the land under the home rather than a unit in a condominium association, which changes your insurance, maintenance and resale pool. One realtor post from 2024 reported the split as 516 single family homes and 216 townhomes. That is reporting rather than record.

The approval also sets the shape of things. Townhome lots are about 20 feet wide, and detached homesites come in 40, 50 and 60 foot width tiers. Homes are capped at 35 feet tall, every detached home needs a two car garage and a driveway at least 18 feet wide, and on the narrower homesites at least 60 percent must be two storey. A clubhouse is addressed on Milestone Drive and the amenity center has its own state permit, so an amenity is designed rather than promised. What is in it has not been published.

Eleven streets named for tomatoes

The streets are addressed and the names are public. Tigeralla Stem Loop is the largest by far, with 167 addresses. Santorini Grove Drive carries 153, Alicante Peel Drive 116, Jubilee Fresh Drive 98 and Campari Leaf Bend 87. Milestone Drive carries 44 and holds the clubhouse, Fruitful Legacy Avenue has 34 and the mail kiosk. The small streets are Bellido Lane with 16, Heirloom Garden Place with 13 and Marzano Seed Place with 8. The entrance road is Vista DiRoma Boulevard. Bellido Lane is an existing street to the south that this community extends.

Read those names again, because they are not a marketing conceit. Tigeralla, Marzano, Campari, Jubilee and Alicante are tomato varieties, with Heirloom, Grove, Peel, Stem and Seed around them. This was the DiMare family's tomato farm, and this stretch of road was the heart of the Ruskin tomato district, where growers organized a cooperative in the 1940s and shipped from a packing house on the highway frontage until it was demolished in 2019. The packing business still operates across the railroad. Naming the streets after what grew on this ground is a builder theme genuinely about the place.

Where this is, and why it is not Waterset

The site sits just north of where 30th Street NE meets Waterset Boulevard, in Apollo Beach, in the unincorporated part of the county, so there is no city government here.

Waterset, the large master planned community that has defined this submarket for a decade, wraps around this land on three sides, and you reach the new neighborhood through Waterset streets. You will see this community described as being in Waterset. It is not. This is a separate approved community on land outside the Waterset development order, with its own district, so its assessments, amenity and board are its own. The distinction is useful rather than technical: you get the location, with the Waterset Town Center and its shops and restaurants less than half a mile away, and you do not get Waterset's amenities as a matter of right, because you are not paying into them. Ask that directly when a sales office opens.

Two boundary conditions deserve a plain statement. A rail corridor about 130 feet wide runs the full western boundary, with US Highway 41 beyond it, so the tract does not front the highway. A power transmission corridor about 367 feet wide runs the full eastern boundary. Both are permanent neighbours, and where your homesite falls relative to them matters for comfort and resale. Freight rail and a transmission corridor are obvious on the ground and invisible in a rendering, so walk the specific homesite.

Otherwise the location is strong. Interstate 75 at Big Bend Road is a little over two miles away in a straight line, the fast route to Brandon, Tampa and Bradenton. Big Bend Road and US 41 carry the everyday retail, the bay and the nature preserve are about four miles west, and downtown Tampa and St Petersburg are both thirteen to sixteen miles off in a straight line. We do not publish drive times, because a straight line is not a drive.

One commute deserves honesty because it is the most searched here. MacDill Air Force Base is under ten miles away as the crow flies, and that number is meaningless, because there is no bridge from south Hillsborough across the bay. The real drive is roughly twenty five to thirty road miles, north and then west. Plenty of people make it daily, but do not budget your morning against the straight line.

The road that controls the timing

This is the most important timing fact about DiMare Farms. The approval ties construction here to rebuilding the road along the eastern boundary, which the county classified as substandard.

Three conditions follow, in plain English. No building permits may be issued at all until that connector road is designed and permitted. No more than 300 homes may receive a certificate of occupancy until the road is substantially complete and open for use. And a further cap, at 700 permits and 700 completions, is tied to a traffic signal at the nearest major intersection.

We could not establish whether the road has reached the designed and permitted milestone, and we will not guess. What it means for you is simple: any delivery date quoted before building permits are being issued is a target, not a schedule, and that target depends on a road project rather than a production line. If you are selling a house or ending a lease around it, ask in writing.

The community development district, and what it will cost you

A community development district has been established here under the recorded name. That is a fact with money attached, and the item most likely to be missing from anything else you read about this project.

Here is what a district is. Florida law lets a developer create a special purpose local government over the land it is developing. The district issues bonds, uses the money to build roads, drainage, utilities and amenities, and repays them through an assessment on every home inside its boundary. That assessment is collected on your annual property tax bill, and it is not optional. It usually has two parts: an operations charge, and a debt charge that runs two to three decades. It is on top of any association dues.

Here the record shows the district exists, an assessment lien is recorded against the land, the bonds have been validated, the court step before they are issued, and the annual operating budget is roughly 486,000 dollars. What it does not show is the amount each home will pay. No per homesite schedule has been published, and we will not estimate one, because the allocation, bond size and term are all unset.

So when pricing is released, ask for the adopted assessment schedule in writing before you sign, with the annual total split into operations and debt and the year the debt ends, and add it to your mortgage, taxes and insurance. Districts are not a reason to walk away, but a four figure annual assessment changes what house you can afford, and it is easier to learn that now than at a sales desk.

Taxes, fees and insurance

Because this land is unincorporated rather than inside a city, the unincorporated rate applies. The county's final 2025 millage for this tax district totalled 18.2515 mills, about 1.83 percent of taxable value a year, covering the county levies, the unincorporated services levy, library, school, port, transit and water management. The City of Tampa rate that year was higher, at 19.8428 mills. Those are 2025 final rates and rates move annually. The millage is the base, not the bill: the district assessment sits on top of it.

If this will be your permanent residence, Florida's homestead exemption is worth 51,411 dollars of assessed value under the statewide figure set by Florida law, and it caps how fast your assessment can rise.

There is also a cost already inside the price of the house. On the 2024 basis in the county's own approval record, impact and mobility fees for a detached home come to about 19,890 dollars, made up of mobility, school, parks and fire components. You will not see a line item for it, but it is one reason new construction prices where it does.

On insurance, be realistic and then be specific. One Florida agency site estimated the countywide average annual premium at about 4,150 dollars for a typical owner occupied home with around 300,000 dollars of dwelling coverage, in an article dated mid 2026, without publishing its methodology, so treat it as an estimate rather than a rate. A new home built to current code, with a new roof and wind mitigation credits, generally prices well below a county average driven by older stock.

Flood mapping, honestly

About 97 percent of this site is mapped outside the special flood hazard area. A strip of roughly 7 acres along the western edge, about 3 percent of the site, is mapped inside the special flood hazard area, with a published base flood elevation. A further share, a little under a third, sits in a shaded lower risk coastal band that is still mapped outside the special flood hazard area. The constrained ground is on the west side, where roughly 19 acres of wetland sit and the approval's conservation setbacks apply. That is where the open space will be.

Put that beside the local claim history. In this ZIP code, federal flood insurance records show 985 claims all time, and 728 of them, nearly three quarters of every claim ever filed here, came in one month, September 2024, during the hurricane surge. About 90 percent of those claims were on policies rated inside the special flood hazard area. That is a waterfront and canal front story. This tract sits inland of the rail corridor with almost all of its ground mapped outside the special flood hazard area, a materially different exposure from the ZIP average.

None of that settles your address. Individual homesites do not have their own records yet, so before you commit to one, have the flood determination pulled for it.

Schools

The district is Hillsborough County Public Schools, which is countywide. There is no municipal school district here, and the school board reviewed this rezoning and did not request a school site inside the community.

Attendance zone assignment for this plat is not established. These addresses were created within the past year, so nobody, including us, can honestly tell you which elementary, middle or high school a child here will attend, though there are campuses at all three levels within roughly two to three miles. If schools decide this purchase, confirm the current zone for the specific address with the district before you go to contract.

Why buyers are looking at new construction in south Hillsborough

The stretch from Riverview down through Apollo Beach and Ruskin has been one of the busiest new construction corridors in Florida for a decade, because it is the last large area of developable land within reach of the Tampa job market. Buyers get newer homes, current code, warranties, and a choice of lot and plan that does not exist closer in.

The trade offs are just as real. New communities arrive before their roads do, which is what the road condition on this approval is about, amenities come at the end, and the district financing shows up on your tax bill for decades. At this stage the advantage is choice: the buyers who get the homesite they want in a 750 home community are the ones paying attention before the first release.

How this compares with what is nearby

Buying a home from a production builder, with someone on your side

Start with who works for whom. The person at a builder's sales desk is employed by or contracted to the builder. They are usually knowledgeable and often helpful, but they represent the seller, and nothing you tell them is confidential the way it would be with your own agent. You can have a Florida licensed agent instead, touring with you, reading the contract line by line, and pushing for the incentives, upgrades and closing cost credits the builder is willing to give.

The timing point is what costs people real money. On new construction the builder has typically already budgeted for a buyer's agent whether you bring one or not, so representation generally costs you nothing. But you usually have to be represented from your very first visit or registration. Register alone, and many builders will decline to recognise an agent you bring afterwards, for that community, permanently. Here there is no sales office to walk into yet, so that door is still open.

Then read the contract knowing what it is. A production builder's purchase agreement is not the standard resale form. It is drafted for the builder and generally gives it room on delivery timing, on substituting materials, and on when your deposit is at risk. Incentives are often tied to the builder's own lender or title company, which can be a good deal or a worse rate dressed up as a credit, and the only way to know is one competing quote. Find out too what is standard specification and what is a structural option that must be chosen before the slab is poured.

Two things specific to this community: ask for the district assessment schedule in writing before you sign, and remember that on the third phase, where no plat has recorded, a homesite does not legally exist yet, so a reservation taken before then is weaker than a contract on a platted lot.

What we are watching next

Any of these will trigger an update to this page and a note to the list: a recorded plat for the third phase, the first building permits, an adopted district assessment schedule, a sales center, a model, a price release, or the final retail name.

Be first in line

Get on the DiMare Farms interest list

Tell us how to reach you and we will let you know when pricing, floor plans, the district assessment schedule and an opening date are released for DiMare Farms, and connect you with a licensed local professional who can represent you. No cost, no obligation.

Subdiview is operated by a real estate broker licensed in Illinois. We are not your agent, we do not represent you, and we perform no real estate brokerage services in this state. No one at Subdiview is licensed in this state. If you join an interest list, your information is referred to a real estate professional licensed in the state where the property is located, who will contact you directly. We are compensated by that professional's brokerage, not by you.

Common questions about DiMare Farms and Vista DiRoma

How this works, and who we are

Subdiview is operated by a real estate broker licensed in Illinois. We are not your agent, we do not represent you, and we perform no real estate brokerage services in this state. No one at Subdiview is licensed in this state. If you join an interest list, your information is referred to a real estate professional licensed in the state where the property is located, who will contact you directly. We are compensated by that professional's brokerage, not by you.

Subdiview is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Lennar Homes. Lennar Homes and its community names are trademarks of their respective owners and are used here for identification only. All community information is compiled from public records and is subject to change.

Lennar Homes appears here because it is the homebuilder named on the approved plan and the applicant of record on the rezoning that created this community. The land is owned by a separate land banking company, the owner of record on every instrument and the developer named on the plat. Nothing here is a launch announcement, and we are not affiliated with the owner of the land, the county, or any government body named here.

Everything here is drawn from public records, and we have said plainly where a record could not be reached or a fact could not be established rather than filling the gap. We did not search civil court dockets for this community and we make no representation about litigation, liens or financing instruments affecting it. Approvals, conditions, home counts and names can all be amended, dates are targets, and tax rates, fees and premiums move. Verify anything that will decide your purchase against the primary record for the specific address before you rely on it.