Wake County developer turns to narrower lots for lower-cost homes

Brookfield Residential is betting that narrower 26-foot lots can trim enough cost to matter in Wake County, where the median home sale price hit $450,000 in January and Zillow put the county’s typical home value at $482,534 as of April 30. The new Cottages Collection at Wendell Falls starts at $374,990 for the Carter, $389,990 for the Aiden and $399,990 for the Blair. At a 7% 30-year mortgage with 20% down, the principal-and-interest payment would be about $1,996 a month for the Carter, $2,076 for the Aiden and $2,129 for the Blair, before taxes, insurance and homeowners association dues.

The 65-home release sits in the final phase of Wendell Falls, the 1,100-acre master-planned community in eastern Wake County that opened in 2015 and now counts more than 2,000 homes sold. The project, a joint venture involving North America Sekisui House and Brookfield Residential, spans 273 acres of preserved open space, more than 10 miles of trails, parks, playgrounds, pools, waterparks, The Farmhouse Café and Treelight Square. The website says Wendell Falls has seven builders and homesites ranging from 26 to 60 feet wide.

Brookfield says the narrower lots help the economics because more homes can be placed on the same land even as construction costs rise and developable acreage tightens across eastern Wake County. The three plans are the Aiden at 1,699 square feet, the Blair at 1,893 and the Carter at 1,619. Brookfield will showcase one of the plans at Wendell Falls Model Park during a May 16-17 grand opening, and the community already has a mix of parks, trails and retail that makes the smaller homes easier to market as lifestyle products rather than simple starter houses.

Even so, the collection looks like a better fit for buyers with strong incomes and savings than for households chasing a bargain. It is likely to appeal most to first-time buyers who can manage a roughly $2,000 monthly mortgage payment, downsizers who want new construction without moving back to a large lot and Raleigh-area buyers who are still priced out of the city’s core. Brookfield is also selling single-family homes on 26-foot lots from Garman Homes and McNeill Burbank in the same final phase, a sign that tighter-lot housing is becoming one of the region’s main tools for making new construction look more reachable without making it cheap.