A builder has plans for 100 single-family houses in a neighborhood in Columbus County, North Carolina, which has seen its population dip in recent years even as the number of residents soars in the nearby coastal region.
The houses in Cottonwood Place, in the southern part of the county on the South Carolina line, will start in the $200,000 range, builder Century Communities said in a statement. Buyers will have single- and two-story options with up to four bedrooms. The neighborhood will be 12 miles south of Tabor City, a town of about 4,300 people, 26 miles from the Atlantic coast.
"We're excited to offer an exceptional lineup of floor plans at Cottonwood Place, featuring a great price point in a location with small-town charm and close proximity to the coast," Dave Hodgman, Century’s executive vice president of field operations, said in the statement.
The North Carolina Office of State Budget and Management estimated that Columbus County, which had 50,625 people in 2020, dropped to 49,866 by 2024. Meanwhile, neighboring Brunswick County, which sits on the Atlantic coast, jumped from 136,689 residents in 2020 to 169,448 in 2024. The population in Horry County, South Carolina, which sits on the other side of the state line from Cottonwood Place, has risen by more than 250,000 since the 1980s, according to county data.
Both Brunswick and Horry counties are considered part of the Wilmington-Myrtle Beach region, which the moving and storage company Pods ranked as the best place to live in the country for the past three years. Pods cited the area’s affordability, friendliness and access to nature.
Century Communities is based near Denver and has built housing in various parts of the U.S., according to its website, but the company’s largest concentration of developments is in the Southeast.