Coastal boom moves inland

The new waterfront:
(Excerpts from this article pertaining to Brunswick County Real Estate)

North Carolina's beaches have been heavily developed for years. But along the state's 3,000-plus miles of mainland waterfront, a second land rush is on, with sleepy river towns awakening to dense development. What will it mean?

Lotteries for lots
In some cases, coastal land is too valuable to be used for golf.
Big-time development on the Brunswick mainland has been going on a decade or more. Roads are lined with billboards promoting developments, and since 1999 the county has approved subdivisions with nearly 60,000 home sites on the mainland coast. A fourth of those came just in the past year.

Development on the mainland near Brunswick's beaches has been so vigorous for so long that well-located large tracts are difficult to find. So developer Mark Saunders bought two golf courses to convert most of the property into subdivisions. Another developer is planning to do the same to a third course.

On two weekends in May, Saunders staged three-day events at two of his projects to sell lots. Customers flew in from as far away as San Diego, enjoyed catered meals and chair massages, and toured the area in two helicopters chartered by Saunders.

The first event was at a former course near Ocean Isle Beach, the project he has named Ocean Isle Palms. The company had to conduct a lottery -- as it also did at its other May event -- to determine the order in which buyers could pick lots, which cost $230,000 to $350,000. The first phase, nearly 200 lots, sold out by the second day, so the company offered lots it had planned to sell later.

The day after the event, the sales director for the project, a soft-voiced Scotsman named Donald Howarth, sat at a table in his office behind a foot-high stack of sales contracts, signing them as if he were a professional athlete giving autographs.

"Had we had more property ready, we would have sold more," he said.
Still, some developers acknowledge that many sales are speculation, a phenomenon that helped drive up prices on the beach. And with tens of thousands more mainland lots on the way, some are wondering whether all the expected retirees will come.

"I hope we're not all chasing the same few thousand people," said Larry Gwaltney, a real estate agent in Oriental on the Neuse River.

Developer Fred Fletcher is a former Raleigh resident who's a partner in building Moss Landing, a condominium and townhouse project in downtown Washington with units selling from $425,000 to $1.2 million. He thinks 20 to 30 percent of buyers at most projects plan to resell quickly.
"I'm hopeful that the speculation and flipping will wane so we can get to the true customers," he said.

One of Howarth's customers during the wild sales weekend at Ocean Isle was Paul Lofgren, 57, a retired health care administrator. He and his wife, Jane, 56, run an inn on Martha's Vineyard, the New England getaway island.

They first visited Brunswick County in 2004 and fell in love with it. They bought property in another of Saunders' projects and eventually hope to make it their primary home. The new lot is an investment. Given the boom, they figure it's a solid bet.

Back in Massachusetts, they have become missionaries for the Carolina mainland coast, persuading seven couples to buy here.

"Ten years ago, all you heard was Florida," Paul Lofgren said. "Now everyone seems to be talking about North Carolina."

Staff writer Jay Price can be reached at 829-4526 or mailto:jprice@newsobserver.com