Grayson Park Business After Hours for the North Brunswick Chamber of Commerce

It's been a few weeks (a month really) since the North Brunswick Chamber of Commerce had a Business After Hours, so yesterday, despite heavy local rain and traffic-bedeviled bridges from Wilmington, NC, we had a successful event hosted by Grayson Park, a Steven Fine Homes community in Leland, NC.

When we arrived the appetizers were laid out and we dug in, awaiting the heavier stuff that was stuck in traffic (for two hours!).

NBCC board member and publisher of NBM and SBM magazines Justin Williams.



Our host was Grayson Park's Dennis Nipini (left), here talking with Connie Reeves and Mr. and Ms. Roy Lettiri.



Linda Cheers, Account Exec with The Brunswick Beacon with Shelton Herb Farm's Margaret Shelton.



Facing the camera are Cape Fear Merchant Services James Shoemaker and Frank Williams of Pioneer Strategies - both are NBCC board members.



NBCC board member Ken Schiess of HDVest with NBCC stalwarts Scott and Connie Reeves of Azalea Plaza.



NBCC Executive Director Dana Fisher with her fiance, Charlie Rivenbark - Charlie's with Maus, Marwick, Matthews commercial REALTORs and a member of the Wilmington City Council.



James Bozeman on the left with Mike Leggett, NBCC board member and photographer and writer for The Local News Review.



Charlie Rivenbark talking with rained upon NBCC board member Franklin Rouse of State Farm Insurance.



Karen Chevrotee of Wilmington South Realty.



NBCC Ambassador Dave Seaton of Pestco with Chad Gilliam from SeaWatch.



Helping themselves at the buffet table are Sweet Nectar Florist's Jerry Rivenbark and Steven Kennedy. This company is  a generous support to the NBCC and the North Brunswick Community - thanks, guys.



Marge Brown of Quantum Results Coaching (yay, Marge!) with Gina Schiess.



So I had to get these guys to smile for the camera. Joe Gaughan (left), an account exec with WECT6 television and Michael Triggiano, General Manager of the Mailbox Express in Leland, and I were having (what I thought anyway was) an hilarious discussion. And  then when I pulled out the camera, they posed.

So naturally I hollered something inane and got them to smile. A whole lot better, don't you think? (Thanks guys, you're both good sports about this.)

One last photo before Marge and I left of Dennis Nipini with Nancy Hall Associate Publisher Jeff Harvell, talking with Linda and Bob Baer.



Thanks to Craig Stevens of Stevens Fine Homes for hosting this event which was successful and a lot of fun despite the heavy rains and traffic.

Stevens Fine Homes Christmas Party for the Leland Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Realty Office

Yesterday the on-site agents for Stevens Fine Homes three communities in Leland had a late afternoon Christmas party for the agents and staff of Leland's Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Realty office at the club house in Stevens' Grayson Park neighborhood. Reps from Grayson Park, Orchid Bay, Cove Landing, and South Brook neighborhoods were there, and so was early arrival Linda Killian, below, a broker with Sea Coast.

Stevens' Stan Powell, newly married and a happy guy.

Stevens Charlotte Palmer and Wendy Melville.

Lori Eaton of EatonatHome.com catered the event. Lori as usual was awesome (the food was good, too!).

Charlotte, Wendy, and Sea Coast's Office Manager Kari Essig and Broker in Charge Denise Kinney.

Stan talking with Sea Coast's Tom Shoat (with Linda waving in the background)

Bruce Brown, Stan Powell, Tom Shoat, and Sea Coast's Craig Spafford.


Wendy and Sea Coast's Howard Bailey.

Sea Coast's Linda Cline.

Sea Coast's Leslie Morgan surrounded by Lindas.

There's Sea Coast's Ophard Willis in the middle of the shot. Sorry it's not a clear shot, but he was there and I didn't want to leave him out.

Okay, so maybe it's true that Kari is not a big chocolate fan. But this photo proves that she sometimes will eat chocolate.

It was a nice event, appreciated by all. My thanks to Cynthia, Stan, Wendy, Charlotte, Lori Eaton, and of course Craig Stevens.

(Stevens' Cythia Rehberg was at the event as well, but working with buyers. I did get one quick shot of her as I was leaving but it didn't do her justice so I didn't use it.)

Grayson Park REALTOR luncheon in Leland, NC

This week I took at trip to Grayson Park in Leland, North Carolina to a REALTOR luncheon. Grayson Park is a community of several neighborhoods, all built by Stevens Fine Homes of Wilmington.

The building below is the gorgeous community clubhouse, behind which is a super pool and tennis courts.


The photo below is me trying to be artistic with flowers, nice wooden doors, and white rocking chairs. This shot also was taken in front of the clubhouse.

On-site agents for Grayson Park at Stan Powell and Cynthia Rehberg. In the video clip below Cynthia says hello.



We were very pleased to discover that Personal Chef and old friend Lori Eaton of Eaton at Home was catering the event. Good stuff. Lori is a much celebrated local chef and caterer and has also written extensively about cooking.

I even talked Lori into saying a few words for the camera:

I'd be honored to show you around Grayson Park, other Stevens Fine Homes neighborhoods in the area, or even other new home communities in the greater Leland area. Call me anytime at (910) 297-8753 or e-mail brucebrown@seacoastrealty.com .

Calypso Green Parade of Homes Party at Grayson Park in Leland, NC

Saturday afternoon Marge and I went to Grayson Park in Leland, NC for two reasons. The first was to tour and talk about Stevens Fine Homes solar model featured in Grayson Park. The second reason was to party!

As soon as we got to the clubhouse and said hello we headed over to the solar model home.

From the front the house looks like the other homes on the street, but state-of-the-art solar panels on the back roof provide all the energy used by the house.

Here's developer and builder Craig Stevens talking about the solar home and the party!



We also met some folks in the market for environmentally sound, energy savings home, including Michael Rhodes, who is touring all the green homes and communities in the area before making a decision.

And, in Michael's words



Inside the model plenty of people were asking about the solar home from Matt, the site's construction manager.

Jennie Steele, Stevens Fine Homes Marketing Director took a few minutes to welcome us also.

As did Cynthia Rehberg, on-site sales specialist.

And Stan Powell, the other on-site sales specialist, here talking and laughing with Marge.

Brian Sartan of the Home Builders Association was on hand.

And happy to say a few words:



We also ran into old friend Lin Spears, Sales Manager of the local Countrywide office

With the introductions made and the good info about solar homes and environmentally-conscious building digesting, it was time to party. As you can see from the photo below, Craig Stevens and I were certainly ready!

Grayson Park residents and their guests, other visitors, and many REALTORs from the area gathered around the pool for food, drink, music, and conviviality.

Middle of the Island, the always-popular catering company, provided the food. It was tasty!

We even had a visit from one of Leland's finest, checking up on the music and the commotion.

The music, provided by Wilmington area's only calypso-style steel drum band, Pantastic Steel, was dance ready and a lot of fun. So if you have about three and half minutes, click on the video below, put it in HD, full-screen mode, turn up your speakers or headset volume and enjoy!

REALTOR Booty Call ! Steel Band Entertains at Stevens Fine Homes Design Center Grand Opening

Thursday afternoon 150-200 REALTORS gathered outside in the parking lot and inside Stevens Fine Homes Design Center on Oleander Drive in Wilmington, North Carolina. Entertained by Pantastic Steel, fueled by food and legal libations, and glued to the spot by near- continuous giveaways, including the big booty, a gorgeous blue topaz David Yurman ring, a great time was had by all. Stevens Fine Homes, with neighborhoods under development in Wilmington and Leland, now has a central facility at 5710 Oleander Drive, space formerly occupied by Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Realty.

Grayson Park Clubhouse and Pool, Leland, NC

In 1968 Burt Lancaster starred in The Swimmer, a movie in which his character travels through a suburb by swimming through residents' pools. I was reminded of the movie concept Wednesday afternoon when I re-visited the new clubhouse and pool at Grayson Park. This fine community, developed by Stevens Fine Homes, is located off US Route 87 north of US Highway 17 is in Leland, North Carolina, about 8 miles west of Downtown Wilmington. (Note to movie producers and other film industry folks: if you decide to do a re-make of The Swimmer based on someone swimming his or her way across a country via subdivision pools, you heard it here first, and I'm NOT the Bruce Brown who made The Endless Summer, the original surfing flick, also in the 1960s.)

Grayson Park has existing and pre-sale homes and townhomes for sale, but whenever I visit this fine neighborhood lately I'm drawn to the clubhouse and more particularly to the pool. I'm not actually much of a swimmer, but my wife Marge is. Marge loves to swim and I like to sit by the pool and read - sometimes my total exercise-oriented activity for the day is counting laps as Marge churns the water back and forth. Grayson Park's pool is, in a word, gorgeous. There are six swimming lanes plus a blocked off shallow area for non-lane swimmers. There's also an adjacent spa and plenty of undercover space at the back of the clubhouse for people who'd rather sit out of the sun but still enjoy the pool area.

The clubhouse itself has a full kitchen, a comfortable seating/lounging members area, shower facilities, and two offices currently used by the Grayson Park sales staff. A new section of homes called Parkside will soon be open with what sounds like an appealing combination of high-end features and aggressive pricing. If you're in the market for a new home and haven't yet seen Grayson Park, and would like to, give me a call at 910-297-8753 or e-mail BruceBrown@SeaCoastRealty.com. I think you'll be very pleasantly surprised at how much you can get for your money by traveling a few minutes west of Wilmington. I'd be very happy to show you Grayson Park and other communities in the Leland and Wilmington areas. In the meantime, I may talk to Marge about doing our own version of The Swimmer - if we can convince the neighborhood people to let us do it, she'll test the lap swimming and I'll practice counting.