Myrtle Beach is a retirement destination like Florida. Developers want to accommodate them

Sam Chiappetta knew the Myrtle Beach area well before he moved full-time.

Chiappetta, 67, attended Belmont Abbey College just outside of Charlotte, N.C., and vacationed in the Myrtle Beach area during college in the early 1980s. He rented a house in Cherry Grove from Elliot Reality, went to the beach, and held barbecues—also making the occasional trip to the local amusement park. However, he couldn’t remember the name.

After college, Chiappetta got a job at General Motors in Massachusetts, where he worked for 21 years. Although, the allure of the Grand Strand remained.

Married for 37 years with two grown adult children, Chiappetta and his wife liked to go on vacation, and a few years ago, Chiappetta pitched going to Myrtle Beach.

“I said, ‘Hey, why don’t we try Myrtle Beach?’” He remembered. “We kind of fell in love with the place, and we said maybe when we decide to retire (we’ll move down).”

That is what the Chiappettas did. In 2018, they bought a house on the Conway and Myrtle Beach border, close to 20 minutes from the beach. Sam said the couple paid in cash for the newly built home, which they are currently customizing it to their liking, and when he took an early retirement from GM, he moved full-time to the Myrtle Beach area in 2023.

Chiappetta likes the area and is comfortable in the Grand Strand. His son is also moving to the area and plans to start a trucking business. Prices are lower, people are nicer, taxes are lower, the weather is better, and many fellow Grand Stranders share his worldview, Chiappetta said.

“I’m more at home down here,” He added.

Chiappetta is part of a larger trend of retirees moving to the Grand Strand area. According to the Census Reporter, the median age in Myrtle Beach is 47, and 47 percent of the total residents are 50 years old and over. Census Reporter also reported that the median age in the North Myrtle Beach, Myrtle Beach and Conway metro area is 50.9, about 1.3 times the United States median, with 50 percent of residents being 50 years old or over. With retirees making up a large part of the area’s population, developers and home re-designers are catering towards them.

Here’s how new retirees are impacting Myrtle Beach, SC’s real estate economy

Indeed, builders are starting to design entire communities for retired-age individuals, often called ‘active adult communities.’ Bruce Carrell is a custom home builder from Myrtle Beach who began his career on the Grand Strand in the 1980s.

Carrell’s built more than 1,200 custom homes and designed the first homes sold in the Grande Dunes area. Recently, however, as plots for custom homes have reduced as golf courses have closed and the downtown Myrtle Beach area has become mostly developed, Carrell turned to building active adult communities. His first one, The Courtyards by Carrell, in partnership with Epcon Communities, opened in Ocean Isle Beach in Brunswick County, N.C., with 66 patio homes planned. He’s already looking for land for his second community.

The transition is natural for Carrell — as many of his custom home clients were already part of the active adult demographic.

“The active adult concept brings some parameters to it that appeal to that group of people,” Carrell said. “Whether that’s restricting the rental opportunities ... that keeps transient traffic out of the community.”

The relationship is symbiotic for retirees, builders, and realtors who service them. Older home buyers typically can pay more upfront for their homes, sometimes in cash alone, reducing the risk for all parties. Carrell said between 30 and 40 percent of buyers pay in cash or leverage assets like 401ks to buy their homes.

Coastal Carolinas Association of Realtors President Brie Bender added that older home buyers are attractive clients given the current marketplace. Fixed-rate 30-year mortgages remain around seven percent, their highest since late 2000 and early 2001, according to the Federal Reserve’s Economic Data. For Bender, retirees with more assets on hand are safer clients.

“When you have somebody that’s bringing cash from the sale from another area, you have less challenges with moving forward with the cash sale than you would financing right now,” she added. “They don’t want to have this carrying costs. They want to just have the home paid for.”

Retirees also serve as a lucrative market for home re-designers.

Newberry Home Improvement started on the Grand Strand in 2020, and Christopher Winey with the company said some of its renovations are geared toward retirees looking to age in place in their new homes.

Newberry Home Improvement does bathroom and kitchen remodeling, Winey said. He added that a significant part of the company’s business is adjusting people’s homes so they can stay in their homes and be more user-friendly.

“We turn the tub into a beautiful walk-in shower that they can easily get into,” He said. “Cleaning is a big factor. Since we don’t use tile and grout, which are always a mess, we use acrylic.”

Walking into the showroom of Newberry Home Improvement at 1732 Edward E Burroughs Highway, Highway 501, you can see appliances designed for retirees aging in place. The showers are walk-ins with nothing to step over, reducing the risk of slipping and falling. Drawers don’t slam shut. Instead, they open and close slowly to protect retirees’ hands. Kitchen cabinets are taller than normal to provide support, and Winey added the appliances are designed to be safer for retirees to use as they age.

He added that retirees look to change their homes to maintain their independence. Simple tasks like walking and showering get more challenging with age, and remodeling a home could reduce danger for retirees, Winey added.

“When you add just simply walking can be a challenge, as you start to lose some of your mobility and your balance; add water and soap, and it’s very slippery. It makes it scary,” Winey said. “A lot of homeowners realize that if there’s a fall in their home, there’s a certain percentage of people that don’t come back home, and they don’t want that. They don’t want to lose their mobility.”

Why retirees are moving to the Myrtle Beach, SC, area

The makeup of Myrtle Beach has changed in the years between Chiappetta’s first visits to the Grand Strand.

Once, Myrtle Beach was known for young adults cruising the boulevard and hopping from nightclub to nightclub. However, the days of the nightclubs dominating the Grand Strand have passed, as many historic places closed beginning in the early 2000s. For the last eight years, more and more retirement-aged people have been moving to the Myrtle Beach area, Myrtle Beach Regional Economic Development Corporation President & CEO Sandy Davis said.

Many retirees are moving for reasons similar to Chiappetta’s. Beth Ferguson-Clarke is a retired school bus driver from Poughkeepsie, N.Y., who lives near the Little River and North Myrtle Beach area with her husband. Ferguson-Clarke moved to the Grand Strand in 2022 and prefers the warmer climate. She regularly attends shows at the Alabama Theatre and visits the aquarium when her grandchildren visit.

“There’s nothing to do really in Poughkeepsie,” She added. “There’s a lot to do here.”

Indeed, the Grand Strand has geographical advantages that other retirement hubs like Florida lack for people moving from places like the northeast United States. Myrtle Beach has a four seasons climate, is closer to retirees’ previous homes, and lacks the severe weather events currently impacting Florida.

While this trend has also sparked a trend of Floridians moving to the Palmetto State in general, Myrtle Beach’s retiree population continues to grow, and realtors, developers, and home re-designers are looking to provide services for the new customer base.