Dutch developer Tom Westermeijer passed away
EDE, The Netherlands — On Wednesday, November 22, 2017, Dutch real estate developer Tom Westermeijer (79) passed away after a short illness. He leaves to mourn his wife, Jannie, and three sons, Johan and Leo & Tom (twins).
He came to St. Maarten in the late 1970’s and fell in love with the Island. So much so that he made use of his real estate developer’s ability to purchase and develop a large piece of property immediately next to the present Divi Little Bay Beach Resort. His plan was to build a multi-million dollar complex unique to the Caribbean.
Unfortunately, only two phases of the five-stages plan were realized, namely the now Belair Beach Resort and the Belair Hillside 100 Home Development project. At the time, the late Max Pandt was the Lt. Governor, and the first cornerstone was placed on September 7th, 1979, right after hurricanes David and Frederic.
Tom Westermeijer, a multi-miljonair at the time, was involved in several large scale real estate projects in the Netherlands. His downfall as a real estate entrepreneur came with failed speculations into developing time-share projects in the Netherlands. Eventhough, he had the full financial banking of the banks, the time-share concept never really took off in the Netherlands.
Eventually, after the last failing of a recreation park development project, called De Hunzebergen close to Emmen in the Netherlands, his company Westermeijer Group was declared bankrupt in 2014. For years, the Westermeijer family ranked in the Quote Top-500 richest families in the Netherlands. But in 2011 they disappeared from the list as their fortune dwindled considerably due to economic crises in the real estate sector.
Amongst family and friends Tom Westermeijer was well-known for his ability to tell jokes nonstop. He even published his own jokes in a book called “On(t)roerend Goed Moppen” (a play on words unproper and property) and donated all the proceeds to charity. Here he is seen depicted in photos with famous Dutch comedian, Andre van Duin.
The only remnant of his Westermeijer Project at Belair in St. Maarten is the sole building that was completed known today as the Belair Beach Hotel. Below is a screenshot of a photo of a book taken from Facebook which tells about the Westermeijer Project.
