'Most powerful house ever': Mars-themed home is latest addition to Davenport fantasy resort

The latest of several multi-story luxury vacation homes operating or planned at the Fantasy Island Resort in Davenport broke ground in August.

The Mars-themed rental property could be open by year's end – and to a thunderous launch.

The Mission to Mars property is 15,000-square-feet and valued at $12 million, its developer said. The home has a ground shaking feature that may be felt as far away as a nearby Publix Super Market during simulated rocket launches to the red planet. 

Emmanuel Mohammed, 42, of Reunion is the president of Extreme Getaway Homes. He said the latest in a series of his themed short-term rentals will be unmistakable from the property’s exterior.

“The world's most powerful house ever built,” said Mohammed, describing his latest rental, which has a multi-story concrete replica of the SLS rocket attached to the home’s facade. Bass reflex speakers will vibrate the ground during launch simulations complete with smoke for special effect, he added. His guests will also be able to traverse the landscape surrounding the mother ship on a “Mars rover.”

This and two other existing properties are located along Fantasy Drive off Ronald Reagan Boulevard in unincorporated Davenport. The nearly five-acre development resides next to Loughman Crossing shopping center, which is anchored by a Publix along U.S. 17/92 North.

Mohammed is listed as the managing member of Hope Rise Development LLC, which is the landowner where the vacation homes are being built, state and Polk County records show.

The Hope Rise cyberspace location is at orlandoattractionhomes.com. The website shows Central Florida visitors options for staying in at least four different themed homes, including a VIP Hollywood experience home.

It can accommodate 70 people and has 20 bedrooms and 26 bathrooms, the website said. One bedroom suite is a pastiche to Marilyn Monroe. Other bedrooms are decorated with movie themes, such as Jaws, Indiana Jones and Scarface, among others.

Inside, there is a bowling alley, basketball court, movie theater and room with video arcade games. Outside there is a lazy river ride as well as a pool, sauna, spa and tiki bar. Rentals start at $4,000 per night, the pricing per night is dynamic and can change based on demand for the luxury accommodations.

Earlier themes: American and Music

Hope Rise Properties opened its first two themed-vacation homes in October 2019 within Solterra Resort.

Among the first built were the "America the Beautiful" and "Music City" luxury homes with 14 bedrooms and 14.5 bathrooms each, according to a 2019 news release issued by Hope Rise.

Those homes were sold to a private investor, Mohammed said. He will retain ownership of the latest homes on Fantasy Drive and run them as rentals, he said, but the right offer could sway him to sell.

All of his properties have various amenities that can include swimming pools, spas, game rooms, bowling alleys, selfie walls, custom lighting, large 200-inch LED displays, movie theaters and game systems with 8,000 games that were designed for Hope Rise, the news release said.

The "Music City" home depicts musical genres and "America the Beautiful" features multiple U.S. landmarks.

For the Mars home, Mohammed had a display made presenting President John F. Kennedy’s Rice University speech on Sept. 12, 1962, in which Kennedy said:

“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.”

And then on the property’s large screen, visitors will see Mission Control as it takes over the countdown for the SLS to launch. Once everything is “go,” the numeric countdown begins. The loudspeaker then says, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”

'Each house is like an attraction'

Once Mission to Mars is completed, the next themed home “is going to be the world's first Titanic house, and I got that idea on my way to Dubai,” Mohammad said, recalling an airline flight earlier this year. “I saw in the flight radar that we were getting closer to the Titanic.”

His air travel was not long after the implosion of a Titanic-bound submersible that killed all of those passengers on board as they attempted to dive down to the shipwreck.

“I'm like, why do we have to have people go down there and die when I can build a house to give them a quick experience and keep them alive?” he said.

The Fantasy Island Resort is part of Mohammed's own American Dream realized. The native of Ghana had immigrated to Ohio and took a job in logistics as a worker in shipping and receiving and then, “I worked like hell,” he said.

His adventure in real estate development is a result of that hard work and an investment in "sweat equity" since immigrating to America, the West African immigrant said.

“Each house is like an attraction,” he said. “So this is like a whole new concept. I don't think I have heard of something like this before. If you had heard about it, I would never do it. I've traveled well over 150,000 miles across the globe and from Asia to Dubai and not heard of it.”

Mohammad first purchased the properties in Central Florida during the COVID pandemic and went through several approvals with the Polk County’s land development division.

According to the division’s director, Benjamin J. Ziskal, Fantasy Island is located within a community activity center land use district identified as the Ronald Reagan Parkway Selected Area Plan.

Short-term rentals are listed as C2 conditional use in county land development regulations that require a staff review for approval, he said. Plans for these types of homes do not require planning commission approval within a selected area plan.

But then there was the helipad

For a soon-to-come security and storage building, Mohammad asked permission to build a helicopter pad on the property. The helipad took more hurdles to clear as this type of property use requires a Level 3 conditional use approval from the county Planning Commission, which it received on April 5 during its second of two hearings.

The proposed helistop will be located on the rooftop of a building containing 10 studio-style apartments used as crew housing and go-cart storage, according to a county planning staff report.

According to county's Land Development Code, helistops require a Level 3 Conditional Use approval by the Planning Commission. The county’s land development code also says helistops cannot be closer than 100 feet from any adjacent residential property, nor can they be too close to schools, churches, stores, hospitals and gas stations nor refineries.

While the resort's heliport is close to Mater Academy and the Publix shopping plaza, the aircraft using the landing spot would arrive and depart along a safe path away from those buildings, the staff report said. And the project team showed the county a Notice of Heliport Airspace Analysis Determination from the Federal Aviation Administration saying the agency had "no objections" to the heliport.

Further, Mohammed and his project team told the county the helipad would function as an “airborne Uber,” shuttling quests to and from the vacation homes to other travel hubs such as the Orlando International Airport at a frequency of about 10 times monthly. So a helicopter would not be permanently on the property.

But residents near the resort spoke out against the airborne Uber at the development, including two veterans who suffer from PTSD and two mothers, one with a 4-year-old child with autism.

Ruben Rodriguez, a former Marine who has run a K-9 police dog training business for 10 years along Four Acres Lane, said he was concerned the helicopters would cause his dogs to bark excessively and worried that helicopters were too dangerous for the highly populated area.

"My major concern is having a helicopter coming in and out," Rodriguez said. "It might cause the dogs to get louder than usual. Now I didn't want to become a nuisance to that area because, like I said before, I've been there for 10 years."

A mother and five-year resident along Ronald Reagan Parkway testified her and her husband were opposed to the helicopter landing at the resort because it would scare her kids.

“We’re completely opposed to this helicopter,” said Brizieidi Delgado, who has three kids who like to play in their backyard. Their backyard is behind a wall where the helicopters would land and takeoff, she said.

“I have three children, one is a baby, she's 7-months old. I have a 2-year-old and a four-year-old, who has autism, and he cannot stand very loud noises. Even the noise of a loud TV, noise of the train, scares him and he throws a tantrum about it.”

Further, she complained that construction activity at the resort has blocked a shared easement to her property and the resort properties along Ronald Regan Parkway.

Still, the conditional use for a helicopter pad gained unanimous approval from the planning commission.

'If you do not love it ...'

Mohammad said it was easier to develop his properties in Polk County than other locations he has developed in Central Florida, including AirBNB properties in Osceola County at Veranda Palms Resort. He said he relied on the professionals in Polk County government for educating and helping him finish his homes.

"They are on nobody's side, they are on the side of getting the job done," he said of government oversight of his development.

"Polk County building (department) they will stand on your toes to make sure it is done well, it is done correct and they have done a great job of that," Mohammad said. "I have nothing but respect for that."

To afford his real estate enterprise, he wakes up a 1 a.m. most days and often hand carries every tile installed at his properties, he said. The value of sacrifice was something that his family who still live in Ohio running a rental property business instilled in him.

"They would give up their tomorrow's meal to help someone else," he said.

Regarding his outlook on real estate development, Mohammed said, "I would say, if you do not love it, please do not do it. Because the pain, the loneliness, the frustration will eat you alive."

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Mars home in Davenport is latest addition to Fantasy Island Resort