A long-dormant subdivision, known as Stillhouse Farm, tucked off South Main Street near Moore Street in the southern part of Graham, has been given new life and a new owner.
Graham’s city council agreed to rezone the area in about 2005, but nothing ever came of the development, and the sale of the property fell through back then, according to Glenn Patterson, a local appraiser who has marketed the property for his family.
The property had been rezoned for 129 homes, and that is the number that Meritage Homes has announced it plans to build; it was unclear how much, if any, the company may vary from those original plans and how much leeway it may have to do so.
Originally, the property was to be bounded by a “southern loop” bypass around Graham, but the Department of Transportation never funded the loop, and Graham’s city council was successful several years ago at getting the loop removed from DOT’s state transportation improvement plan.
The 50 acres for the Stillhouse Farm development recently sold for $1.2 million, according to records at the Alamance County Register of Deeds office.
Meanwhile, earlier this year, the city council agreed to rezone an adjacent 15-acre parcel for 105 townhouses.
Meritage officials would not confirm to the newspaper that they are in the process of pursuing that purchase of that adjacent land, but most of the company’s offerings, such as one in Mebane [see separate story in this edition] have both single-family homes and townhomes; thus far, Stillhouse Farm has only single family.
With respect to the Graham single-family homes at Stillhouse Farm, Meritage says houses will be both two-story as well as ranch styles, with six floor plans with 1,500 to 2,700 square feet. The target market for the houses, according to the company’s promotional material, will be “first-time buyers.”
Grading work on the site has already begun, and the company says it anticipates home sales to begin in “late 2021.”
The company did not give an anticipated price range for the Graham homes, but Meritage representatives told Mebane’s city council earlier this week that similar-sized single-family homes to be built on the Orange County side of the city would likely be marketed in the high $200,000’s to $300,000’s.
While the company bills the Stillhouse Farm development as its first entry into the Alamance County market, the company also won approval last year for another, much larger development in another part of Graham.
The city council has approved a plan, for land off Jim Minor Road near the city’s regional park, dubbed “Riley’s Meadow,” which would have 393 homes on 77 acres – 252 single-family homes, with minimum lot sizes of about one-tenth of an acre, and 141 townhomes.
That development drew some neighbor and council opposition because of its high density and small lot sizes, but was approved on a 3-2 vote.
Meritage Homes describes itself as the nation’s sixth-largest public homebuilder, based on homes sold in 2020. The company also markets itself as an “industry leader in energy-efficient homebuilding.”
See story on Mebane city council’s approval of rezoning for Meritage’s 409-home subdivision on the eastern side of Mebane (in western Orange County). https://alamancenews.com/mebane-council-oks-rezoning-for-409-homes-on-orange-county-side-of-city/
See story on rezoning for 105 townhouses on property adjacent to the new Meritage Homes subdivision of single-family homes. https://alamancenews.com/council-agrees-to-200-single-family-home-subdivision-on-split-vote-unanimously-for-105-townhouses/
