3.75% at The Lakes, 3.99% at Midpoint, 4.99% at The Heritage — What New Riverside Sellers Need to Know
Bluffton, South Carolina • Real Estate Insights
There are three builders in New Riverside offering aggressive incentives to buyers right now.
If you are a homeowner here thinking about selling, your competition is not just the home down the street in your neighborhood. It is also these three builders — K. Hovnanian at The Lakes, Pulte at Midpoint, and Smith Family Homes at The Heritage. The incentives are different at each builder, and they change from month to month as they move through their inventory.
What each builder is offering is real competition for you, and it affects what your home is worth.
K. Hovnanian at The Lakes
The Lakes, K. Hovnanian Homes is offering 3.75% on a 7 year ARM (Adjustable Rate Mortgage, ask me more if you don't know what this means) with no cost to the buyer on one of their "Quick Move-In" homes, priced at $503,900. The same home can also be purchased for $469,900 at the current market rate with a $10,000 credit from the builder — usable towards a rate buy-down or towards the buyer's closing costs. Other "Quick Move-In homes" at The Lakes at New Riverside have different incentives, and those will change as their inventory moves. K Hov wants to be fully built out at The Lakes by early next year. This is how they'll hit their timeline — aggressive financing and pricing.
Pulte at Midpoint
Midpoint by Pulte Homes is offering buyers here in New Riverside incentives that can get their mortgage rates as low as 3.99% on a 7 year ARM and 4.99% on a 30 year fixed through serious rate buy-downs, as well as credits toward the buyer's closing costs. Right now Pulte's incentives apply across all available lots at Midpoint, not just their Quick Move-Ins. They are also offering a $40,000 incentive on some of their homesites and $20,000 on others. Midpoint has about two more years of build-out ahead, and the incentives will continue to change as Pulte moves through their inventory this Spring.
Smith Family Homes at The Heritage
The Heritage by Smith Family Homes is offering 4.99% on their Quick Move-In homes, and a 5.5% rate plus a $15,000 credit toward closing costs on their other available homes. Smith Family has 75 homes left to build at The Heritage, with Phase 10 coming up as pre-sale — that build is about 9 months from contract to close. The Heritage incentives change month to month, so what they are offering today might change by October.
What All Three Have in Common
All three builders are advertising aggressive rates, serious money to offer in credits towards closing costs, and strong incentives on their homesites. They have inventory to move and timelines to hit, which is why their offers are going to keep coming. As a homeowner thinking about selling here in New Riverside, that's also the real competition, and it's what you have to be thinking about when you set your price.
Here's How the Math Works
Here's how the math works on one of the more aggressive interest rates being offered in New Riverside right now — The Lakes offering 3.75%.
A buyer who looks online or walks into the sales office without having talked to a savvy mortgage professional is going to see the offer of 3.75% and it's going to spark their interest. The open market right now on the same loan product is closer to 5% to 5.125%. A buyer who isn't working with me or a good mortgage broker is looking at a payment closer to $2,047 a month at 5.125%. The offer looks like it saves them about $180 a month compared to what the open market is currently offering.
That math looks much different once you compare it to the interest rate I'm able to offer as a mortgage broker.
The 4.625% rate is what I'm able to offer my clients. As a mortgage broker, I have access to all of the major wholesale lenders in the nation, plus a bunch of lenders you've never even heard of that I have direct relationships with. Our pricing is about half a percent better than what the open market is currently offering. This isn't a sales pitch. It's just how the broker world works.
Assuming the same scenario, with the buyer putting 20% down on both options. At the higher-priced option of $503,900, on the 3.75% rate at the 7 year ARM, the principal and interest payment comes to about $1,867 a month. At the lower-priced option of $469,900, with the $10,000 builder credit going towards a rate buy-down at 4.625%, the principal and interest payment comes to roughly $1,932 a month.
That's a $65 difference between the two options. Property taxes on the higher-priced home are calculated at a higher value, adding about $15 to $20 more a month, which brings the actual difference between the two options down to about $50 a month.
Against the 4.625% rate I'm able to offer, the savings on that 3.75% builder offer is about $50 a month — and the buyer isn't tied to one specific home to get it.
Why This Matters For You As The Seller
Buyers shopping New Riverside are looking at homes online first. That's where the search starts. Many of our buyers aren't even from the area — they're in bed late at night, scrolling listings on their phone in whatever free time they have. They're putting their list together before they ever fly down to see homes in person.
A brand new construction home offering an interest rate of 3.75% is going to get their attention. A new listing priced like the builders aren't running aggressive incentives is going to get scrolled past.
Your competition isn't only the home down the street in your neighborhood. It's also what the builders are offering at their communities at The Lakes, Midpoint, and The Heritage — and you have to price that in.
If you price your home right, it sells.
If you price your home like the builders aren't running aggressive incentives, it's going to sit, take three price reductions over the next eight months, and eventually close at a lower number than you should have.
Why Your Home Has to Stand Out Online First
Buyers are scrolling through listings all day, every day, all night, in any free time they have. By the time they fly down to see the homes in person with their agent, they've narrowed the list down to a handful that stood out online to them.
In a community like New Riverside, where many of the homes were built around the same time with similar floor plans and similar finishes, a lot of homes can look like each other. To sell your home, it needs a wow factor — something that makes a buyer stop scrolling.
A wow factor can come from real money spent on upgrades — an updated kitchen, an updated bathroom, updated flooring, changed-out finishes, an outdoor living space, real landscaping. That's what makes a home different than what the builder was offering at the time, and that's what gives the home its wow factor. It shows up in the photos online, and it shows up again once buyers see the home in person.
If all there is to make the wow factor is the price, then the price has to be the wow factor to make the home sell.
When a home is priced right against what's currently on the market and what's already sold in the community, it gets more views, more saves, more buyers calling their agents to set up showings, offers, and ultimately a sale.
New Riverside Market Snapshot — 60 Active Homes, 66 Under Contract, and What That Tells Us
How Buyers Decide If a Home Feels Worth It
Why Your Home Might Feel “Off” to Buyers (Even If It Isn’t)
What To Do With This If You Are Thinking About Listing
Three things.
One. Hire the right Realtor before anything else. A good Realtor in New Riverside knows what the builders here are offering, and will use that information and data to price your home right.
Two. Make sure your Realtor knows what's going on at the builder sales offices. A good Realtor is in these offices regularly — Jules was at Midpoint earlier this week, and at The Lakes and The Heritage today, and knows the builders well. We keep on top of this so that it's properly calculated into the real price of your home.
Three. Move while the buyer pool is active. K. Hovnanian is working to be fully built out at The Lakes by early next year. Pulte will keep advertising aggressive offers while it works through Midpoint's Spring inventory. Smith Family Homes has 75 homes left to build at The Heritage. The incentives are tied to those timelines. The buyer pool is also still very active — 19 homes have gone under contract in New Riverside over the past 15 days. A homeowner who lists at the right price now is selling into a market with active buyers. A homeowner who waits six months is selling against builders pushing even harder than they are today.
Pricing your home right from the start is what makes everything work.
Jeff & Jules Moran
Anchor & Isle Real Estate
Bluffton & Hilton Head Island
Strategic Marketing. Experienced Negotiation. Real Results.
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