Pleasant Valley Properties buys Bremer Bank building
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By LeAnn R. Ralph
COLFAX — Pleasant Valley Properties has purchased the Bremer Bank building at 301 Bremer Avenue in Colfax.
“As we are transitioning through some changes and with the continued growth of Pleasant Valley Properties, it made sense to begin to look for another location for the rental property business,” said John Scharlau of Pleasant Valley Properties.
“When I heard that Bremer Bank was closing the location in Colfax, I contacted them and put a deal together to purchase the property in Colfax,” he said.
Pleasant Valley Properties is a rental business that focuses primarily on manufactured home communities (MCHs). The company also owns duplexes and four-plex buildings, although the majority of the buildings are MCHs.
Scharlau said they started in 1992 with the purchase of a 36-unit property south of Menomonie.
“This would be the first property that would eventually become Pleasant Valley Properties. We started to grow the business slowly at first as we were also concentrating on other business ventures as well,” he said.
Pleasant Valley Properties owned and managed about 400 sites until 2004 when the company began to focus on expanding the rental business.
“We changed the name at that time to Pleasant Valley Properties as we were also operating Pleasant Valley Tree Farms and had our offices located in the same building,” Scharlau said.
Pleasant Valley Tree Farms is located southwest of Colfax off county Highway E on 810th Street.
“We have expanded to where we now provide homes and sites to 2,600 residents in four states, including Nebraska, North and South Dakota and Wisconsin,” Scharlau said.
Pleasant Valley Properties currently has 22 full-time employees with nine working out of the main office and the others working as property managers living in other locations. The company also employs 26 part-time employees.
“We also have many subcontractors, including plumbers, electricians, carpenters, tree services and asphalt maintenance companies that we hire on a regular basis. Having a strong group of employees is a large part of our business,” Scharlau said.
With the purchase of the Bremer Bank building, “I saw this as an opportunity to move our business to a a great community. Our ties to the community go back generations as both of my grandparents lived there as well as my mother being born and raised there. My parents recently moved to Colfax, so it seems like a natural fit to locate our business there,” he said.
Pleasant Valley Properties closed on the Bremer Bank building on December 4. The company plans to update and remodel offices as well as add several offices and a conference room on the main level.
“We anticipate the remodel and updates will be completed in March with the move shortly thereafter,” Scharlau said.
Village board
The Colfax Village Board approved a sign request from Pleasant Valley Properties at the December 9 meeting.
Lynn Niggemann, village administrator-clerk-treasurer, received an e-mail message from Scharlau dated December 5.
In his message, Scharlau wrote, “We are working on getting signage made for 301 Bremer Avenue. Would the village of Colfax be ok with having ‘Welcome to Colfax’ on the sign as you enter town and ‘Thanks for visiting’ on the north side of the sign as you leave town? If there is an issue with this, we will put something else on it. Please get back to me when you can.”
Village board members said they were willing to accept Scharlau’s proposal but were concerned about whether the time and temperature sign also would still be operating.
Village Trustee Margaret Burcham, who was previously employed by Bremer Bank, said she would be happy to show personnel from Pleasant Valley Properties how to operate the time and temperature sign if they wanted.
Margaret Burcham made the motion to accept the sign proposal.
Village Trustee Anne Jenson said she would second the motion.
“I will second as long as we have time and temp!” she said.
The Colfax Village Board unanimously approved Scharlau’s sign proposal.
Voting in favor of the motion were Village President Scott Gunnufson, along with Village Trustees Mark Halpin, Carey Davis, Anne Jenson, Margaret Burcham and Keith Burcham.