After several years of slow growth, the Charlotte new home market is responding to growing customer demand, with several projects announced for the south Charlotte region in July. With everything from a small condo community Ballantyne to a large luxury home community in Weddington in the works, these changes seem to indicate that homebuilders are confident in the changes in the market.

In June, Charlotte issued 339 permits for new single-family detached homes, according to he Charlotte Observer. This is up a full 15 percent over the number from last year. Experts believe this is a slow, steady climb out of the recession. But a better indication of the growth is a look at the first half of the year. From January to June, 3,300 single-family-home permits were issued. This is an increase of 42 percent over the 2012 numbers.

What is creating this growth? According to developers, it’s in response to growing consumer demand. As interest rates are starting to go up, people are wanting to make a move before the historic low rates of the past few years are gone forever. The problem developers in Charlotte are facing is the need for more land, which has led to several requests for re-zoning to turn retail space and farmland into residential communities.  Here are some highlights of the proposed developments.

Bromley Estates

In February of 2012, Toll Bros. purchased a failing new home development that had 17 homes and 103 empty lots. They opened as a new home community in September, and since then the builder has sold two dozen new homes. The custom homes come in six designs with prices between $500,000 and $900,000.

Crosland Southeast

A $200 million multiuse project is in the works for 90 acres of farmland in south Charlotte. Once the area is rezoned, it will feature houses, office buildings and medical facilities, with an upscale grocery store anchoring the development.

Fifty-Five 16 Ballantyne

If rezoning is approved, 53 town homes are in the works for the north side of Ballantyne Commons Parkway. These homes would have three and four-bedroom layouts with a price tag between $250,000 and $400,000

Avignon

Another rezoning request, this time from David Weekley Homes, will allow for the building of 36 detached and attached single-family homes on Sharon View Road. These executive priced housing units will occupy 5.22 acres behind the Philips Place shopping complex.

These developers are being more strategic in their planning than they were prior to the recession. Charlotte won’t be seeing as much speculative developing, but a stead influx of new homes should be hitting the market in the next few months.