About Us

www.CarolinaAirparks.com

In 2004, Bruce came across a unique airpark home that the owner agents couldn’t sell. The property had lingered on the market for over three years with multiple real estate firms. Bruce simply said, “I can sell this house.”

That night, he went home and built our first website—NC-Airparks.com. He found a buyer, sold the house, and sparked a wave of interest that launched our journey.

From there, we began researching every airstrip in North Carolina, building a comprehensive database while learning how to protect residential aviator buyers from risks not covered in traditional real estate training.

Our commitment led to collaboration with developers and even the NC DOT Department of Aviation, sharing insights they hadn’t uncovered.

Despite Bruce’s 2007 brain tumor diagnosis, our business flourished—but after his passing in 2008, the aviation market collapsed nationwide due to the recession in that same year. Economic struggles stalled aviators’ dream of ‘living with their planes’ for years.

Following Bruce’s death, I found solace in studying airpark communities in the Carolinas, collecting information about each airpark subdivision (down to details about each lot in every airpark community), and updating and redesigning our website, calling it CarolinaAirparks.com because we now covered all of South Carolina, too.

During those years, I also had the privilege to work at the NCDOT Department of Aviation booth at Sun n Fun in Lakeland, FL, and at AirVentures in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, where I met aviators from all over the world.

Spring 2015 brought renewed interest in aviation real estate, and website traffic surged. At first, buyers weren’t interested in airpark lots—but the market quickly flooded with hangar home listings and cautious buyers. By summer 2016, interest turned serious. Buyers wanted modestly priced hangar homes, not empty lots. Prices began to climb, and buyers grew more discerning.

Today, most aviator buyers still prefer existing homes with hangars. As of late 2023, North Carolina had no hangar homes for sale, and South Carolina had only one. Since then, most hangar homes that hit the market sell quickly.

Prices for airpark properties have more than doubled since 2012, with some years seeing jumps of up to 40%. Demand continues to outpace supply, and hangar space at most airports is virtually nonexistent—leading to the byline we stand by: “The best way to get a hangar is to buy a house with one.”

To reach the buyers that aviation communities truly need, we continue to advertise extensively in major aviation outlets.

And for sellers? Proper exposure matters. One seller lost nearly $30,000 by avoiding the open market and selling his inherited hangar home himself.

We’re here to make sure that doesn’t happen to you.

Whether you’re buying or selling, we’d be honored to help you navigate the journey.

As interest grew beyond North Carolina, we began receiving calls from aviators in South Carolina—where no comparable service existed. With Charlotte so close to the state line, many of our buyers were exploring aviation properties in both states. But we also noticed something important: some South Carolina owners hesitated to list with a company that had “North Carolina” in the name.

They wanted to feel equally seen and represented. So, we listened. We expanded our research to include South Carolina’s airpark communities and runway properties—and Carolina Airparks was born. The name reflects our broader mission: to serve aviators across both states with the same care, insight, and dedication that launched us in 2004.