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PAGE 22 VOLUME 28 NUMBER 17 ■ CHARLESTONBUSINESS.COM
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SEPTEMBER 19-OCTOBER 2, 2022 ■ $2.25
Nucor Corp. to invest $200M in 5-year span
Med mood
Mediterranean-inspired bar now open downtown. Page 4
By Ross Norton
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New purpose
Historic home to become college career center. Page 7
INDUSTRY IN FLUX New homes are built at Piper Glen, a Great Southern Homes development in Pendleton. (Photo/Ross Norton)
Popular place
Publix-anchored center adding new tenants. Page 9
Going public
Great Southern Homes to become publicly traded. Page 12
INSIDE
Upfront ................................ 2 SC Biz News Briefs ................ 3 In Focus: Residential Real Estate........11 List: Residential Real Estate Companies......................... 15 Bonus List: Independent Insurance Agencies ........... 19 At Work .............................. 21 Hot Properties ..................... 21 Viewpoint ...........................23
Buyers and renters find uneasy housing market By Christina Lee Knauss cknauss@scbiznews.com
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he seasons are changing in South Carolina and so are conditions on the residential real estate market, with recent statistics suggesting it is no longer exactly a buyer’s or seller’s market in many regions of the state. For buyers, home prices remain high while interest rates on mortgages are going up as the Federal Reserve has raised rates in an effort to slow inflation. Meawhile, unlike this time last year, sellers are not seeing their homes get snapped up as quickly in some parts of the state, with the amount of available inventory slowly rising in some areas while the number of buyers decreases, experts say. At the same time, many renters are having a hard time finding available and affordable space because of a lack of avail-
able rental units, and builders aren’t rushing to build new ones in some markets because of high building costs and difficulty finding property. “It’s harder to buy and harder to rent right now than it was last year,” said John Smith, president of the Central Carolina Realtors Association. “That is something we’re seeing in the Midlands and also what we’re hearing from people in Greenville and Charleston as well. The market for sellers is still good, but some sellers are pulling back because the demand has dropped. In many cases, they’re not getting the prices for their home that they got back in March and April of this year.” Prices for a new single-family home in the Charleston region continue to remain high, with the median sales price in the Charleston market rising 10.6% in August to $395,900 according to the August monthly report
by the Charleston Trident Association of Realtors, which includes Berkeley, Dorchester, Charleston and Colleton counties. This follows a statewide trend, according to statistics compiled by the S.C. Association of Realtors, which indicates that median sales prices jumped 19.7% in the second quarter and 17.6% in July alone. While they might get more for their home, it is taking sellers a longer time to make that sale. Sellers in the Charleston area are facing a slightly longer wait times to sell their homes, with the days on market rising 18.8% in August to 19 days, the report said. The supply of inventory in the region also was up 33.3% to 1.6 months. Buyers in the region are facing challenges both because of the sales price increases and
Up, up and away
Boeing resumes delivery of Dreamliners to Europe. Page 10
See RENT OR OWN, Page 12
rnorton@scbiznews.com
ucor Corp., one of the largest manufacturers of steel and steel products in North America, intends to spend more than $200 million on Berkeley County facilities in the next five years, including a building that supplies industrial gases to the mill’s central operations. Nucor’s expansion will include the construction of an air separation unit to supply industrial gases to the company’s steelmaking operations at 1455 Old Hagan Ave. in Huger. When complete, the air separation unit will be operated by UIG LLC, a Nucor wholly owned subsidiary that specializes in industrial gas supply and services, Nucor said in a news release. This project will allow Nucor — through UIG LLC — to produce and supply all the gases needed for the steel mill from the new Nucor-owned facility. “Nucor acquired UIG LLC in 2019 so that we would have the capability to design, build and operate our own air separation units, giving us an alternative to long-term service contracts with outside providers,” Nucor Steel Berkeley Vice President and General Manager Mike Lee said in the news release. “We are proud of our company’s long-time partnership with the state of South Carolina, and we are excited to continue to invest in the state where Nucor first began operating nearly 60 years ago.” The expansion is expected to be completed by the end of 2024. The company did not say if the investments will create jobs but did indicate it continues to hire. “Nucor Steel has been a critical part of Berkeley County’s successful industrial sector for over 26 years, having invested $1.3 billion since 1996,” See NUCOR, Page 9