Real Estate & Lifestyle Posts in WNC

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 17, 2026

Waynesville is raising property taxes this budget season, but the increase is considerably smaller than what residents in the surrounding county are facing. The town board is considering a 2-cent hike, bringing the rate to 49.9 cents per $100 of assessed value. That generates about $306,000 in new revenue and covers less than half of the $721,000 gap the town needs to close.

The shortfall doesn't come from runaway spending. Waynesville's $20.5 million general fund is under pressure from the same cost realities affecting small towns across Western NC: infrastructure, utilities, and most significantly, people. Town Manager Rob Hites has been direct about where the money is going. "We are preventing our competing local governments from poaching our trained staff," he said during budget discussions. The budget includes a pay and classification study targeting salaries at 10 percent above the median for comparable governments, keeping experienced employees from leaving for better-paying positions in nearby counties and municipalities.

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 17, 2026

A letter published in The Mountaineer this week cut against the grain of Haywood County's ongoing development debate: the people moving into those new DR Horton subdivisions aren't the problem. And neither, the letter argues, is DR Horton.

Marshall Casse, writing from Waynesville, pushed back on the idea that developers are villains in this story. His argument is simpler than the heated rhetoric around it: builders build what buyers want to buy. If you want to understand why new subdivisions are going up on land that used to grow crops, start with demand. The developer is downstream of that.

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 17, 2026

A Greensboro billionaire's proposed 305-unit apartment complex on a South Asheville ridgeline overlooking the Blue Ridge Parkway just hit its second delay, and the neighbors who pumped the brakes this time own one of the area's historic summer estates.

At its May 13 meeting, the Buncombe County Board of Adjustments postponed a decision on The Carroll at Sweeten Creek, a nine-building apartment development proposed by The Carroll Companies along Sweeten Creek Road in South Asheville. The delay came after the board granted the Sumer family trust, which owns Round Top, a historic estate on an adjacent parcel, standing in the hearing. Their attorney raised concerns about stormwater runoff and asked for time to bring in engineers to study the project's potential impact.

Photo by MiningWatch Portugal (@miningwatch_portugal) on Unsplash

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 14, 2026

Franklin does not always get credit for what happens here twice a year. This mountain town of about 4,000 people becomes one of the most active gem and mineral marketplaces in the country, drawing dealers, collectors, and families from across the United States for weeks of shows that have been running here for decades.

Franklin has been called the Gem Capital of the World, and the title is not marketing. The hills surrounding town hold ruby, sapphire, garnet, moonstone, and a range of other minerals that have drawn miners and collectors since commercial operations began in the Cowee Valley in 1870. What started as industrial corundum mining eventually became one of the more unusual tourist traditions in the Southeast.

Photo by Cristofer Maximilian (@cristofer) on Unsplash

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 13, 2026

The Great Smoky Mountains draws 13 million visitors a year. Almost none of them find the trail that starts at the back of the Big Creek Picnic Area in Haywood County, NC, and most never know what they're missing.

On the northeastern corner of the North Carolina side of the park, the Big Creek corridor follows an old logging road along one of the clearest cold-water streams in the Appalachians. There is no resort town at this entrance. No souvenir shops along the approach road. Just Interstate 40, an exit near Waterville, and a two-lane road that follows the Pigeon River into the mountains.

Photo by Mikhail Mamaev (@mikhail_mamaev) on Unsplash

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 13, 2026

The Waynesville Planning Board just voted, 6-3, to recommend something residents have been pushing for through years of contentious public hearings: fewer homes per acre across every residential zone in town.

The proposal cuts allowable density by two units per acre town wide. Residential Low drops from 6 to 4 units per acre. Residential Medium falls from 8 to 6. Neighborhood Residential moves from 10 to 8. Urban Residential, the densest category, comes down from 16 to 14. Developers who want to build at the old maximums would need to apply for a special use permit, turning what was once a matter of right into a public review process.

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 24, 2026

The man who started Asheville's craft beer revolution got his own day this month, and the timing could not be better. The City of Asheville and Buncombe County officially declared May 16 as Oscar Wong Day, honoring the founder of Highland Brewing Company, who passed away last May at 84 years old.

Wong opened Highland Brewing in 1994 in the basement of a downtown building, making it Asheville's first legal craft brewery since Prohibition. Over the next three decades, Asheville became Beer City, USA, with more than 40 breweries operating in the metro area. Without Oscar Wong, there is no Beer Week.

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 13, 2026

The median home price in Hendersonville hit $462,000 by mid-2025. The median household income in the city sits at $41,185. That gap does not close on its own, and Hendersonville is no longer content to wait.

On Wednesday, May 27, the city is hosting the 2026 Hendersonville Housing Summit at the Hendersonville High School auditorium, 1 Bearcat Blvd. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. and the event runs until 7:00 p.m. Admission is free.

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 12, 2026

Western North Carolina just got recognized on a national stage for something locals have known for a long time: the fishing here is genuinely world-class.

The Asheville Citizen Times reported that several WNC fishing guides and lodges have ranked among the 10 best in the United States. It is the kind of recognition that confirms what the region's angling community has built over decades, not just the quality of the water, but the experience around it.

By Jon Tharp, Broker  ·  May 12, 2026

A candy shop in a small English market town has been selling the same sweets since before the American Civil War, and the best sellers today are identical to the ones from the 1820s.

The Oldest Sweet Shop in Pateley Bridge, North Yorkshire has been open since 1827. That puts it older than the Oregon Trail, older than the telegraph, and older than most of the buildings in western North Carolina's mountain towns. The Guinness Book of Records made it official in 2014.