If you’ve been watching the North Myrtle Beach real estate market over the past few years, you’ve noticed what a lot of buyers have noticed: inventory is tight, prices have climbed, and the options that fit a reasonable budget are increasingly hard to find.
That’s not a criticism of North Myrtle Beach — it’s a market reality that reflects genuine demand. But it’s also pushing a growing number of buyers to ask a practical question: what’s just north of the state line?
The answer, for many of them, has been Brunswick County, NC. And once they look, a lot of them don’t go back to searching in South Carolina.
What’s Driving Buyers Out of the NMB Market
The North Myrtle Beach market has seen consistent price appreciation driven by a combination of retiree demand, second-home buyers, and investor activity. All of that demand chasing limited coastal inventory has created a market where value — real value, not just sticker price — has become harder to find.
New construction options within North Myrtle Beach itself are limited by geography. There simply isn’t much undeveloped land left in desirable locations, which means buyers are often choosing between older resale inventory or new builds positioned further from the coast than they’d prefer.
For buyers with a clear picture of what they want — new construction, coastal access, a real community rather than a single lot — the NMB market increasingly asks them to compromise somewhere.
What Brunswick County, NC Offers Instead
Brunswick County sits directly north of the South Carolina border, and from the right location within it, you’re a 20 to 25-minute drive from North Myrtle Beach. That proximity is close enough to access everything the area offers — the shopping, the dining, the entertainment — without paying the South Carolina coastal premium to live in it.
What buyers are finding on the NC side:
- New home communities with genuine land and thoughtful master planning — something increasingly rare in the NMB market
- Home prices that represent better value per square foot compared to comparable South Carolina coastal properties
- Lower property tax rates that add up to meaningful savings over time
- Coastal access that’s arguably better — Sunset Beach, consistently rated among the top beaches on the East Coast, is right here
- A quieter pace of life that a lot of buyers actually prefer once they experience it
The Calabash Difference
Within Brunswick County, the village of Calabash has become a particularly compelling destination for buyers making this shift. It sits right on the NC-SC border, which means the proximity to North Myrtle Beach is as close as it gets on the North Carolina side. It’s a real town — with its own character, its own dining scene, and a community that exists year-round rather than just during tourist season.
And it’s home to Kingfish Bay, a master-planned new home community along the Calabash River that represents exactly what buyers are looking for when they cross the border.
Kingfish Bay offers multiple home collections — from low-maintenance cottages to larger waterside homes — alongside a custom program for buyers who want to build to their own specifications. The community sits on more than 60 acres of preserved coastal land, with riverfront amenities, walking trails, a community center, social clubs, and Beach Club access.
It’s the kind of community that doesn’t exist in the NMB market anymore, because the land to build it simply isn’t there.
The Numbers Make the Case
For buyers doing the math, the comparison tends to look like this: In North Myrtle Beach, you’re competing in a mature coastal market with limited new inventory, rising prices, and fewer opportunities to get into a community at the front end of its development.
In Brunswick County, specifically in communities like Kingfish Bay, you’re entering a newer market with genuine upside — buying into a thoughtfully planned community before it reaches full buildout, at prices that still represent value relative to what comparable coastal South Carolina properties command.
Add in the property tax differential and North Carolina’s approach to retirement income taxation, and the financial case for crossing the border gets more compelling the closer you look.
Worth Seeing Before You Decide
A lot of buyers who end up in Brunswick County will tell you the same thing: they almost didn’t come to look. They were focused on North Myrtle Beach, found the market frustrating, and only crossed the border reluctantly. What they found — the land, the community, the pace, the value — changed their search entirely.
If the NMB market has you feeling like you’re always a step behind, it might be worth a drive north. The state line is just a sign on the road. What’s on the other side of it is worth your time.
[Explore Kingfish Bay in Calabash, NC] [View Available Homes] [Download the Discovery Kit]
Kingfish Bay is located at 1235 Kingfish Boulevard, Calabash, NC 28467.
Call 910-579-4657 to speak with our sales team.
