SouthLand Properties

09/01/2026

We are so grateful for SCBIZ publishing a piece by SouthLand's founder and CEO, Nancy Baldwin, on the reasons for our soaring rental housing costs and ways that landlords, renters, and even local governments can help the housing situation.

Here's an excerpt from the beginning of the piece but don't miss the advice she offers landlords, renters, and local governments -- more at the link.

"For the past fifty years I have worked in the rental housing industry, beginning by renting out the other side of a small duplex that my husband and I owned and where we lived. I slowly added rental housing properties as I was financially able, focusing on the neighborhoods in Greenville that I had known and explored as a child. From those early days, SouthLand Properties was formed. We remain local and independent, with forty condos and duplexes catering to a wide variety of housing needs and costs.

I have heard an old proverb that says “The sun at home warms better than the sun elsewhere.”

I do believe that. Offering quality rental properties that can become homes of comfort, safety, and peace is something that has been a passion of mine for many decades. Housing is, for me, not only a business, but also a calling and a mission.

From that perspective I have watched the struggles in the housing industry that we — tenants, prospective home buyers, home owners, landlords, and more — are all experiencing with interest and some dismay. Are there solutions to the issues confronting the housing industry, particularly the high costs?

What drove up housing costs?

Some of the drivers of housing costs are baked into the cake. The federal moratorium on evictions during the pandemic was overturned in August of 2021 — but that meant that some small landlords had no rental income for a year or more. In other states such as California some small local landlords had to go without rent for two years. Inevitably, landlords had to raise rental prices in order to recover sometimes dramatic, business-destroying losses. The eviction moratorium was especially devastating to the small, independent, locally owned housing companies like SouthLand. By the grace of God, not a single one of SouthLand’s tenants missed a month of rent payments.

Inflation arrived as well. The significant increase in living costs, coupled with job losses for so many, decimated some people’s ability to pay rent or buy houses. Inflation also exponentially increased costs for landlords. From 2020 to 2025, for instance, SouthLand’s regime/HOA fees (our largest expense) increased by 30% and taxes (our second largest expense) increased by 16%. Over a similar five-year stretch, from 2019 to 2024 our maintenance expenses increased by a whopping 53%.

In response to inflation, the Fed raised interest rates, so the cost of home buying went up dramatically as well.

In the meantime, certain areas of the country like Greenville County experienced significant increases in new residents which led to housing supply shortages — and wherever there are supply shortages, the cost of the remaining supply always rises.

All of these factors dramatically raised the cost of housing. From a global perspective, the two factors that can eventually contribute to lower costs are a reduction of interest rates and certain other costs, such as fuel and shipping costs.

How can we improve housing opportunities?"

How South Carolina landlords can help lower housing costs

07/17/2026

This two bedroom, one bathroom condo, one block from Cleveland Park and within walking distance of downtown Greenville, is our most recently purchased property. Fully renovated, it's in a lovely, very quiet cul-de-sac neighborhood just off McDaniel Avenue. It will be available for move-in on August 15, and may be viewed from August 1 onward.

Just The Highlights Rent/month: $2100 Security Deposit: $700 2 Bedrooms 1 Bath (ceramic tile) Approx. 1000 sq. ft. Living Room Kitchen: Quartz Countertops, Stainless Appliances, Dining Area Bath: Quartz counters, tile flooring, and walk-in shower Hardwood floors throughout Windows: 2-inch blinds pro...

06/30/2026

After three major projects at the 1939 original McDaniel Heights condo that SouthLand owns (the creation of a laundry closet, the inset for the refrigerator, and the significant bathroom renovation and leak repairs in the unit above not owned by SouthLand -- see previous posts here: https://tinyurl.com/McDanielHeightsLaundryCloset, here: https://tinyurl.com/McDanielHeightsInsetFrig, and here: https://tinyurl.com/McDanielHeightsBathroom,) we completed the renovations of the unit with more general updates in the bedroom and living room, a lovely room with significant window coverage that looks out on some beautiful landscapes and has an exit onto the porch for morning tea or coffee.

In the bedroom we upgraded the electric (switches and outlets), installed a new ceiling fan with lights, installed new doors and hardware, and installed new waterproof plank flooring, as with the rest of the unit. We installed new baseboards in order to support the new outlet boxes. We added in shelves and new cabinet style doors to the smaller bedroom closet (left over from the inset for the kitchen refrigerator).

Throughout the unit we installed new wood jambs, sills and wide curtain header boards for the windows, patched and prepped walls, upgraded the outlets and switches, replaced the AC vent covers, installed new smoke detectors, and painted all walls and trim throughout the unit. We also replaced the entry door hardware and had the original locksets rebuilt and reinstalled with the original keys. The screen doors were stripped, repainted, and new screens installed.

All new appliances, the new washer and dryer unit, and the new furnace were successfully installed.

After seven long months, we completed our work in February and the new tenant who had been waiting patiently moved in in March.

It was truly a labor of love.

06/02/2026

Our addition of a laundry closet and an inset area for the new kitchen refrigerator to save kitchen space in the original 1939 McDaniel Heights unit had been an exercise in ingenuity and creative use of space (you can see posts about those two projects here https://www.facebook.com/SouthLandPropertiesInGreenville/posts/pfbid0ZLhQKLnKMtZoptu53TWiS1YBjGVb9B7udYjzRqMfc5yhkWBrYoPSAacsRvthYyfkl and here https://www.facebook.com/SouthLandPropertiesInGreenville/posts/pfbid02qXFKEcSCVjBgoyeocU1pWDf6NX5y8aQJr4veKYRKdSdCmQdjDWm8uGbgKcPyusZGl ). But our remodel of the bathroom turned into a project that called for perseverance and patience (with a whole lot of frustration mixed in).

Our plans were to replace the old tub, sink and vanity, and toilet, replace much of the plumbing, and upgrade the electric. We began the remodel hoping to save the beautiful original tile flooring, but unfortunately discovered a significant damaged area under the old sink that was not repairable.

In the midst of the work we found a leak that was coming from the unit above our unit (and which was not owned by SouthLand).

And then another.

And then another.

In total, four leaks were repaired in the unit above (the work was paid for by SouthLand), including replacing all the water lines, drain lines, tub drain and stems, seals and washers for the bathtub, and removing the toilet, replacing the floor fl**ge, and resetting the toilet -- all in the unit above our unit.

Our wonderful contractor showed immense perseverance in hunting down the source of the hidden leaks and repairing the bathroom in the unit above our SouthLand unit. In the end, we had to remove all of the drop ceiling and the original plaster ceiling (you’ll see those painful photos in the post), as well as the interior bathroom wet wall and the linen closet (originally accessed outside the bathroom) in order to have full access to the plumbing. To remove the old tub, we also had to remove the plaster wall between the bathroom and living room.

The bathroom adventure became quite epic in scope, well beyond anything we had imagined at the start.

Other much smaller details from our contractor included installing a new shower pan, new wallboard, in-wall backer boards for the towel bars, and installing new grab bars. We also replaced the tile flooring.

One small feature that we added to the hallway linen closet — we created an access from the bathroom area, while keeping the old access from the hallway. It’s nice to be able to reach linens from the bathroom after all!

This was a long and somewhat discouraging journey — the bathroom was probably the most challenging project in the entire renovation process for this unit.

But — we do like the final result. Be sure to click through to the end on the photos to see how things turned out.

05/05/2026

During our renovation of the 800 square foot 1939 McDaniel Heights condo we turned our attention to the small narrow kitchen. How could we improve space and flow in the kitchen as much as possible while upgrading almost every aspect of the room?

We realized that the refrigerator in that narrow space was intruding into the room, chopping a small room into two smaller sections.

After further exploration we noticed that on the backside of that kitchen wall stood the bedroom, with a closet on that wall.

What if we opened up the kitchen/bedroom wall and used a part of that bedroom closet to inset the kitchen refrigerator? We thought carefully about this as a significant concern was that it might take away too much of the limited closet space in the unit.

We removed the divider wall between the kitchen and bedroom, and redesigned that wall to include a refrigerator nook. The end result was highly successful, with the new large refrigerator tucked back into the space that had been a part of the kitchen wall and bedroom closet, saving floor space in the kitchen itself. Fortunately we still had room to keep a good portion of the closet space for the bedroom too.

We also removed the kitchen cabinets and flooring, installed a new service panel and other electrical upgrades, installed a new interior wall to attach the new kitchen cabinets with granite countertops, installed a new header beam and trim, and installed a new kitchen floor and trim.

To hide the old electric and provide space for new kitchen lights we installed a framed drop ceiling and replaced the light fixture.

We kept all of the lovely old entry doors, including the kitchen door which was stripped and repainted. The original locksets were rebuilt and reinstalled with the original keys.

The photos show a progression from August of 2025 to March 2026. Click through to the end to see the final result for the kitchen.

[For our previous post on how we added a washer dryer unit to the limited floor plan for this unit, see here:
https://www.facebook.com/SouthLandPropertiesInGreenville/posts/pfbid0ZPCB1yceSw34wWaEcumGiZ3z8BFspGkVdX2QtwkbByZWP6PLUqpn5Trj9dGVTAnQl ]