Thirty years ago, Lake Norman, 25 miles to the north of Charlotte, – was primarily a weekend retreat, its shores dotted with tin-roofed boathouses, mobile homes and fishing cabins. That began to change, however, with the completion of I-77 in 1976. Suddenly it was possible to live like you were on vacation all year round only a quick 20-minute drive from work, shopping and entertainment in the big city.

Lake Norman, like Lake Wylie, its sister lake to the south, is a “working” lake, created by Duke Energy for the generation of hydroelectric power. Both are part of the Catawba River system. Norman is the larger of the two lakes though, with 520 miles of shoreline in four counties - Mecklenburg, Iredell, Lincoln and Catawba. At nearly 34 miles long and 8 miles across at its widest point, it is larger than the Sea of Galilee and often referred to as “The Inland Sea.” When Charlotteans refer to the Lake Norman area, they usually mean the area north of the Harris Boulevard / I-77 interchange, which includes Huntersville, Cornelius and Davidson in Mecklenburg County. In less than 20 years, the three towns have been transformed from sleepy rural hamlets into thriving towns with all the amenities of city life, from business parks to bistros, housing to health care. Area residents can now take advantage of the $56 million Presbyterian Hospital in Huntersville, on NC 73 at I-77.

In 1990, 3,000 people called Huntersville home. But proximity between the Queen City and the lake, lower home prices, less traffic and quiet communities has catapulted Huntersville’s population to more than 30,000 today. Two-lane country roads once woven through pastoral farmland are now clogged with cars, and the wide-open space is becoming increasingly filled with new housing, offices and retail development. Cornelius also has felt Lake Norman’s growth spurt, climbing from 2,500 residents in 1990 to more than 15,000 today. The catalyst to growth in Cornelius was a town-financed water-sewer project along West Catawba Avenue in the late 1980s. Large, upscale developments such as The Peninsula arrived, adding hundreds of homes to the area. Services and shops followed, and Cornelius embraced the population boom by welcoming commercial development. Upscale shopping centers line West Catawba Avenue off Exit 28. Shoppers flock to Jetton Village, Shops on the Green, South Lake Shopping Center and strip after strip of boutiques and eateries on West Catawba Avenue. Now the shops have overflowed to East Catawba, where old bungalows and stately brick homes have been converted into funky, fun downtown boutiques.

The boom in population has been music to the ears of home builders and real estate agents. Newcomers can choose from a broad range of home styles and prices in gated communities, family-friendly neighborhoods with sidewalks and bike trails, waterfront (water front) condominium communities with boat slips or spacious luxury apartments. Many neighborhoods offer private golf facilities and amenities such as a residents’ club or country club that offers swimming, tennis and dining facilities. These include The Peninsula Club in Cornelius, River Run Country Club in Davidson, and North Stone Club in Huntersville. Birkdale Golf Club, part of a 600-home master-planned community in Huntersville that includes a residents’ club, has one of the best public courses in the state of North Carolina.

As any developer will tell you, retail follows rooftops and the Lake Norman area is no exception. Lake shoppers can now browse unique boutiques, quaint village shops, upscale specialty stores or national chains. In the town centers, entrepreneurs are converting homes, warehouses, old mills and train depots into craft, consignment, antique and clothing shops. Restaurants, which used to look at Lake Norman as a secondary location, are now opening here first, then branching out to Uptown and other parts of Charlotte. Neo-traditional neighborhoods sometimes referred to as “new urban design,” have recently become a trend in the Huntersville / Cornelius area. By combining homes, shops, service businesses and restaurants in a self-contained community linked by sidewalks and open green space, they offer a new twist on the village concept. Birkdale Village on Sam Furr Road in Huntersville includes apartments and offices above boutiques, restaurants and national retailers such as Williams Sonoma, Gap, Talbot’s and Ann Taylor Loft. Live bands play on warm-weather weekend evenings, and parents from around the lake bring children to splash and play in the village square fountain. The Nantucket-style shopping center’s quaint Main Street is lined with locally owned stores, a pizza parlor, ice cream shop, wine room, a 16-screen stadium-seating movie theater, bookstores and clothing shops. Above the retailers, The Apartments at Birkdale Village feature 45 different floor plans among 320 units, with everything from a loft to a three-bedroom with garage.

Of the three North Mecklenburg towns, Davidson has been most resistant to Lake Norman growth. The town is named for Gen. William Lee Davidson, a local Revolutionary War hero who died in the battle of Cowans Ford in 1781 and the namesake of Davidson College, the town’s small liberal arts school founded in 1837 by the Presbyterians. Still a college town that locals often call a village, Davidson embraces a Main Street, know-your-neighbors way of life. Many folks have lived here for decades, while others have moved here for the small-town atmosphere, tranquility and easygoing pace. While Huntersville and Cornelius experienced massive growth in the 1990s, Davidson grew by just over 3,000 residents. Today the small college town has just over 7,500 residents.

Across the three-town area in North Mecklenburg, planners have struggled to manage growth and provide services while preserving the warmth and small-town charm that attracts new citizens. Although much of the retail and residential areas in Huntersville are new, the town also has numerous historic sites within a five-mile drive of Beatties Ford Road. Hopewell Presbyterian Church, for instance, dates to the 1740s and features 200-year-old stone walls around its cemetery. The Hugh Torance House and Store, started in the 1770s, is the oldest surviving store site in North Carolina. The two-room log cabin also sat on a cotton plantation and was used as a school for young ladies, slave quarters and an overseer’s house. Each April, the Loch Norman Highland Games celebrate the area’s Scots-Irish heritage with athletic competitions, bagpipe music, dancing, tartan parades and historical demonstrations. Another pocket of preserved Huntersville is Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, the county’s largest green space with hiking trails, picnic shelters, a nature center, an equestrian center, boating and fishing on Mountain Island Lake and the Carolina Raptor Center, which rehabilitates and releases injured birds of prey.

Many educational options are available to children in the Lake Norman area. There are public schools that are free, and private schools that don't receive funding from the state and charge tuition. Additionally, there are charter schools - liberated from some of the traditional school regulations, and magnet schools that have a particular focus, such as art or technology. Camp Thunderbird, a YMCA-operated summer environmental camp, attracts hundreds of school-age children for fun and learning.

There are several religious institutions in and around the Lake Norman and Charlotte area. The birthplace of Billy Graham, Charlotte was and still is locally known as the "The City of Churches." In recent decades, Judaism has thrived in Charlotte and the Carolinas. Over the past 10 years, the Jewish population of the Charlotte region including Lake Norman has grown by at least a one-third to an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 individuals. Lake Norman Jewish Congregation is a spiritual home for Jews in the North Charlotte and Lake Norman areas.

Lake Norman residents already enjoy two top-notch county parks in Cornelius – the 105-acre Jetton Park with lake access, tennis, bike rentals, walking trails, picnic shelters, playground and a beach; and Ramsey Creek Park, a 43-acre waterfront park with two large picnic shelters, a playground, volleyball courts, picnic facilities, fishing and boat slips. The brand-new, 18-acre, town-owned Torrence Chapel Park features ball fields, tennis courts, jogging trails, basketball courts and picnic shelters.

There are nearly a dozen marinas that offer wet or dry boat storage starting at $1,000 annually. If you’re putting your own boat into the water, public access ramps are available at Jetton Park, Blythe Landing and Ramsey Creek Park in the Cornelius / Huntersville area. Iredell County public access areas include Hager Creek Access at Exit 33 and McCrary Creek Access, Pinnacle Access and Stumpy Creek Access off N.C. 150. In the Denver area on Lake Norman’s west shore, head to Little Creek Access Area on Webb’s Chapel Road or the Beatties Ford Access Area on Unity Church Road. Catawba County boaters can choose from several marinas on lower Lake Norman south of the N.C. 150 bridge or Long Island Marina on Burton Drive. Unless you’re on a boat or have access to private land, 1,600-acre Lake Norman State Park in Troutman is the only place swimming is allowed from Lake Norman shores. The park also offers boat ramps, picnic shelters, campsites, mountain biking and hiking trails. Huntersville also has a new family fitness center and outdoor fun park where kids can slide through tubes, spray water cannons and climb sprinkler-filled jungle gyms set inside a pool.

If you are looking for a Lake Norman home for sale, or Lake Norman Agent/ Realtor or a Lake Norman builder, Carolinas Metro Realty and our real estate professionals welcome the opportunity to help you in your property search. Our real estate Agents / Realtors will provide MLS listings and help you find the home of your dreams whether you are looking for a waterfront, water view, inland real estate property, a lot, home site, land or acreage for sale. If you wish to build a new home our agents can always recommend a reputable builder in Lake Norman or the greater Charlotte area. Lake Norman lakefront and lake view homes, as well as water front and water view lots and new home sites are available for sale, rent and/or lease with an option to purchase. If you are not ready to buy or build a new home yet, a CMR relocation agent can assist you in finding temporary housing whether you simply want to rent, lease, or lease with an option to purchase.

Business Owners! Each year corporations, large and small, look towards the Carolinas as a prime location to headquarter their company. Carolinas Metro Realty offers Commercial Real Estate Services throughout the Greater Metropolitan Area of the Charlotte Region, North and South Carolina. Our real estate agents and realtors can assist your company in making this evaluation and in relocating your employees to the Greater Charlotte area.

Investors! Our agents work with investors and owners of all ranges, from $100K to $10M. As a part of our services, our commercial and residential property management experts will also help manage your real estate assets. We handle foreclosures, short sale, land acquisition, rental, retail and office leasing through our Property Management division. Carolinas Metro Realty property managers are ready to help you with market analysis and other aspects of property management.

Please call or e-mail any of our professional Realtors to find out why so many homeowners want to call Lake Norman home. CMR Realtors look forward to assisting you with all your relocation needs in Lake Norman, Lake Norman , Charlotte and surrounding areas of North and South Carolina. For your convenience, we have real estate agents who can speak Russian, Ukrainian and other Slavic languages.

Request Free Relocation Package

Thirty years ago, Lake Norman, 25 miles to the north of Charlotte, – was primarily a weekend retreat, its shores dotted with tin-roofed boathouses, mobile homes and fishing cabins. That began to change, however, with the completion of I-77 in 1976. Suddenly it was possible to live like you were on vacation all year round only a quick 20-minute drive from work, shopping and entertainment in the big city.

Lake Norman, like Lake Wylie, its sister lake to the south, is a “working” lake, created by Duke Energy for the generation of hydroelectric power. Both are part of the Catawba River system. Norman is the larger of the two lakes though, with 520 miles of shoreline in four counties - Mecklenburg, Iredell, Lincoln and Catawba. At nearly 34 miles long and 8 miles across at its widest point, it is larger than the Sea of Galilee and often referred to as “The Inland Sea.” When Charlotteans refer to the Lake Norman area, they usually mean the area north of the Harris Boulevard / I-77 interchange, which includes Huntersville, Cornelius and Davidson in Mecklenburg County. In less than 20 years, the three towns have been transformed from sleepy rural hamlets into thriving towns with all the amenities of city life, from business parks to bistros, housing to health care. Area residents can now take advantage of the $56 million Presbyterian Hospital in Huntersville, on NC 73 at I-77.

Convention & Visitor Bureaus:	Utilities:
Charlotte Convention & Visitors Bureau The York County Convention and Visitors Bureau	Telephone: Bell South Verizon Wireless Electricity: Duke Power Natural Gas: Piedmont Natural Gas

Banks:	Hospitals:
BB&T Centura First Citizens First Union Bank of America SouthTrust Wachovia	Carolinas Healthcare System Presbyterian Healthcare System Piedmont Healthcare System Carolinas Medical Center - Pineville

Sports:	Media Print :
Winthrop Eagles Carolina Panthers Charlotte Checkers Charlotte Bobcats CharlotteGolf.com Charlotte Knights	Lake Wylie Pilot State Newspaper Business Journal The Charlotte Post The Charlotte Observer

Radio:	Television:
WYLI-LP 93.7 FM - Lake Wylie Community Radio Station90.7 FM WFAE95.1 FM WNKS99.7 FM WRFX103.7 FM WSOC104.7 FM WSSS105.7 FM WFMX106.5 FM WEND107.9 FM WLNK 1110 AM/99.3 FM WBT	WCNC NBC 6/36 WSOC ABC 9 WBTV CBS 3 WJZY UPN 46 WFVT WB 55

North Carolina & South Carolina:	Weather:
Web Server for the state of North Carolina NC Wildlife Resources Commission NC Boating regulation, registration, education, maps, publications and safety NC Fun Stuff South Carolina Information Highway South Carolina Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism SC State Parks Guide South Carolina Travel	Current Clover/Lake Wylie Weather Current Charlotte Weather Duke-Energy Local Lake water levels www.accuweather.com

05/30/2008 Lake Norman Jewish Community News 05/27/2008 Jewish community growth in Charlotte area 12/09/2008 Want to know more about Lake Norman water front real estate? 05/27/2008 Lake Norman Relocation

Short Sales

It is estimated by the U.S. government that by year’s end of 2010, over 50% of home owners who have a mortgage on their home will owe more than the value. While loan modifications can offer short term solutions, unfortunately nearly all of these home owners will be unable to qualify for any debt forgiveness.

Many home owners are delaying the inevitable, cashing out hard earned retirement accounts, using credit cards to pay bills and borrowing money from family members to try to keep their heads above water. True financial relief from a short sale is what most homeowners in hardship need.

We are a local real estate firm based in Charlotte, NC that specializes in short sales and bank negotiations for homeowners like you.

•	Our agents work to get you forgiven of your debt 100%, regardless of what you owe on your home
•	You do NOT always have to be in default to work a short sale on your home
•	We are NOT investors, and are not here to attempt to "steal" your house and profit from your misfortune
•	We will assign you an experienced local short sale specialist to market your home and negotiate the short sale with your lenders
•	We will guide you through the entire process and answer any questions you have along the way
•	A short sale done properly will stop the foreclosure of your home
•	Our services are ALWAYS 100% free for you, your lender pays ALL fees and closing costs, period

Contact us to discuss your personal unique situation with our short sale specialist by filling online form on the right or contact us

Call 704.405.0634
E-mail at info@carolinasmetro.com
Fill out online form

We are looking forward to the opportunity to work with you!