Living on Topsail Time

"Nights in Rodanthe", filmed in North  Topsail Beach, Wilmington, and the Outer Banks   community of Rodanthe is scheduled to open nationwide in September. An invitation only screening will be held on   September 24th at a movie theatre in Kill Devil Hills and a second screening will be held the following evening in Wilmington. The movie will open internationally in      October.

Nicholas Sparks, the author of this and     several other novels, lives in New Bern, N.C. "Nights in Rodanthe" follows the relationship of a doctor, played by actor Richard Gere, meeting a middle aged woman (Diane Lane) who is taking care of an inn on the North Carolina coast.

Locals and visitors alike will recognize many of the film's locations, from the windswept beauty of the Outer Banks, to the wide, sandy beaches of Topsail Island.

Nights in Rodanthe is just one of many films that have been filmed in North Carolina in recent years. "Leatherheads", starring George Clooney and Rene Zellweger opened earlier in 2008, filmed in Greensboro, Winston-Salem and Charlotte.

It is the final HUGE week end for the summer visitors on Topsail Island. Both Kathy and I noted yesterday that the ICWW was sidewallk to sidewalk with boaters. The weather is hot, humid and perfectly suited to a day on the water, lazily making your way to the marina in Surf City, or down to Bluewater for a leisurely lunch. The "ditch" is coastal North Carolina's liquid interstate highway, providing ingress and egress to the myriad water based communities along its length. One of the super parts of living where we do is that we can watch the tugboats manuevering their barges, and the occasional cruise ship navigating the sometimes tricky waters. Many a livelihood is made on bays, sounds, channels, inlets and and the ICWW, furnishing some of the best seafood ever tasted. The Stump Sound oyster for example, is quite possibly one of the sweetest I have ever tasted. I've mentioned several times over the past few posts that Topsail Island is at her best in the fall. Come go coastal in North Carolina!

Wow. From the title, this had better be a great post. Today on Topsail Island, our neighborhood of Sunset Harbor had a community work day. I will be completely candid and tell you that my wife, Kathy did not participate in this project. Bugs, perspiration, hauling tree limbs and pulling stumps out of the ground just isn't her idea of fun. We had a great turn out otherwise, most of the homeowners and some of the temporary residents pitched in as well. It was a wonderful opportunity to connect and talk. This is a small neighborhood of only 12 homes. We look out after one another. No land available for sale and no view that we currently have can be compromised. We have serene views of the sound and Intracoastal, although we would have to build an 100 foot pier across the marsh if we wanted to access the water. Sunset Harbor is full of the beautiful old live oaks that make this little part of Surf City dramatically different. All in all, a great place to call home.

First Fay, now Gustav. We are old hands at this storm business after spending so many years on Topsail Island. My wife is fond of saying, "you pay your money and you take your chances, especially if you want to live this close to the ocean." The trade off is the unbelievable sounds of the waves crashing on the beach just a few streets over and the views from our sound side home of the Intracoastal. Lots of marsh between us and the water but the sunsets, especially in the winter are magnificent. Most folks think of the beach as a summertime place to go but candidly, the fall and winter are the absolute best seasons to be here. The crowds are gone and the beach walks are mostly just us and our dogs. Yep, I am glad to see the fall arrive. Now, if we can just keep it a secret for a while longer...

Always good, no matter what your line of work may be, to have a day or so where you are not totally immersed in the business of "doing business." Wednesdays are that day for us, although we work every day, even if it is just catching up on email or making a few calls. The weeks since StarPower, we have been busy putting our new systems into place, working on our goals and trying to become better agents and a better team. We are looking forward to the Labor Day visitors to our island and the fall season.

Wow! We know that Florida is experiencing heavy rains as a result of the tropical storm but it is absolutely gorgeous here on the island today. Low humidity and light winds. Spent some time at the local farmer's market this morning and picked up some of the season's first scuppernong grapes. While we are not big fans of the wine made from those grapes (just up the road in Duplin county) the grapes are just wonderful. Reminds both Kat and me of our childhoods, when the grape arbor in the back yard was a perfect shady place to hide out on a summers afternoon. The added bonus was all those grapes, as long as you could fight off those vicious yellow jackets and wasps to get to them. Visit your nearby farmers market and see if they have a few containers of scuppernong grapes, find yourself a shady place to sit and experience a little bit of heaven!

Topsail Island is a barrier island just off the coast of North Carolina. The ocean waters here are an unbelievable blue, shocking when you consider that this particular blue is normally seen in the Caribbean waters or in the Keys. It always surprises friends when they view photographs from the beach. "Where is this?" "When did you travel to Key West?" The fact that these waters and the wide beaches of soft Carolina sand are only two hours or so from Raleigh, seven hours from the mountains of North Carolina and within six hours of Washington, D.C. and the same from Atlanta. (Well, give or take an hour or so). Easy driving distance, get here in a day and spend long lazy days on the beautiful Topsail Island beaches.

Come and enjoy!

We traveled to Orlando by car for the Star Power conference, and arrived on Monday evening, which allowed us a full day on Tuesday to rest, relax and plan. All of our team members were staying in the same hotel, just moments from the site of the event. We decided to make a trip over to Epcot and spend the day (all except for Judy Carlton, who had not yet arrived). Kathy and I had not visited Epcot in quite a few years and we were looking forward to seeing new exhibits but were disappointed. Pretty much the same. We did visit the aquarium and took a few shots of one of my favorite sea creatures, the sea horse. There were some other extremely interesting fish, as you can see.

Just before we went into Epcot, Linda Blackburn's step daughter, Ashley, took a photo of us. Note the sign "Year of a Million Dreams", appropriate, don't you think? That's Bob Ramsey, his wife Kathleen, Linda, me and my wife and business partner, Kathy.

We had a great time in Florida, always do. Glad to be back home on Topsail Island! 'Course, it's great to be a real estate professional in North Carolina!

Our "mothership", Sea Coast Realty has its corporate offices in Wilmington, N.C. Now, our company president prefers that we refer to corporate headquarters by its geographical location, Mayfaire. Mayfaire is the name of the shopping area that is designed, built and functions like a small town with shops at street level and living areas above. You probably have one similarly constructed close to you. It truly is an interesting concept and posesses extreme walkability to all of the shops, restaurants, cinemas, markets, banking and professional offices etc. In these days of $4.00 + gas, that idea is becoming more and more attractive. Closer to Topsail Island, we have the condominium community of Topsail Landing. Residents can walk to a grocery, doctor and dentist offices, restaurants, a variety of small shops and a bank. On site amenities include a pool, fitness center, business center and a gamesroom. PLUS, the community is located just 1.5 miles from the beach at Topsail Island! More and more developers are purchasing land, especially in the area around Topsail with an eye to making their communities walkable or bikeable. What is happening where you are? 

We and members of our team are getting ready to attend the StarPower conference in Orlando, Florida next week. My wife and business partner, Kathy and I attended last year and it changed our business lives forever. We came back from the conference energized and with a new laser-like focus on how to "work on our business and not in it". Sounds like an easy thing to do but it is most definitely challenging. One of the things that Howard Brinton and the stars advise is to set three goals before you leave the conference. Taking away only three ideas to place into contention is a difficult task as well. There are so many wonderful concepts and ideas that the stars are willing to share with all attendees. We are extremely pleased to have accomplished those three goals and five more, besides. One of the comments we make when speaking to anyone about StarPower is that we wish we had attended one of these conferences much earlier. For a new agent, it is an opportunity to learn from the best in the business. For agents with a little more experience, it is a chance to look at different methods of doing the basics (and there are new and better ways to do that). We are looking forward to sharing this experience with our team and seeing what changes we will be able to make in our business for the coming year.