Piedmont Historic Homes

Updated March 12, 2022

Recent Sales

Some older properties, especially outsized, rural ones, are marketed as possible commercial properties — B&B’s, vineyards, event venues and such — rather than or in addition to residential use.

303 Burke Street, Gibsonville, Guilford County
The Burke Manor Inn & Pavilion
listing withdrawn January 2021; relisted March 2021
listing withdrawn November 2021
relisted January 2023

• $2.3 million (originally $2.2 million)
• Listing: 9 guest rooms
  • Guilford County records: 6 bedrooms, 7 1/2 bathrooms, 5,166 square feet
  • 3.3 acres, split by the Guilford-Alamance county line (2.64 acres in Guilford County and 0.67 acres in Alamance)
• Price/square foot: $445
• Built in 1906
• Original listing date not known
• Last sale: $1.1 million, January 2011
• From the website of this North Carolina inn and restaurant for sale: “Caesar Cone, a textile magnate and co-founder of Cone Mills Corporation, built the house on 303 Burke Street in 1906. In 1911, Caesar Cone sold the home to J.W. Burke, where 4 generations of the Burke family resided in the estate. The Brady Family bought Burke Manor in 1999 and restored the home to its original grandeur, as designed by the Cone family. The Brady’s converted the grounds into an inn with the idea of transforming the house into a bed & breakfast. The owners today, Lori and Lil Lacassagne, purchased Burke Manor in 2011.”
  • Broker listing: “a Select Registry® Inn with a AAA 4-Diamond Restaurant and purpose-built wedding and event pavilion”
  • “The manicured grounds and gardens at this North Carolina Inn and restaurant for sale also feature a fenced-in pool area and a Pool Cottage that is currently in use as owner’s quarters, but could be converted to a 10th guest room.”
  • Search-engine optimization note: Four of the first five paragraphs of the listing contain the words “North Carolina Inn and restaurant for sale” or “North Carolina inn for sale”.
  • For some reason, the state Historic Preservation Office lists it as the “Clarence Cone, Sr. House.”

• $2.3 million (originally $2.21 million)
• 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 1,428 square feet, 24.84 acres
• Price/square foot: $1,610
• Built in 1846
• Listed December 5, 2019
• Last sale: $1.26 million, November 2015 (included 15 across Williams Road that are not included in this sale)
• Note: These properties were part of the late Westbend Winery. Another 15 acres of the former winery, located across Williams Road, were sold separately in 2022 for $1.725 million.
  • The property includes three houses; a five-stall, 36-by-72 Morton barn built in 2016 with European Fronts and water stations in each stall; a Morton workshop, 48-by-72, built in 2016; and another, older workshop, 60-by-40.
  • The main house has a commercial kitchen and a bar and can accommodate up to 150 for events.
  • The other two homes are a 3-bedroom, 3-bathroom home, 1800 square feet, built in 2021; and a 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom modular home.

1097 Healing Springs Road East, Crumpler, Ashe County
The Cabins at Healing Springs
National Register of Historic Places

• $1.68 million
• 16 units in nine buildings, 6,276 square feet, 11.32 acres
• Price/square foot: $268
• Built in 1888 (per listing; other sources say some cabins were built in the early 20th century with the rest are ca. 1920)
• Listed November 29, 2021
• Previous listing: “The historic Healing Spring was discovered in 1884 and was originally called Thompson’s Bromine and Arsenic Springs. The property was then known as Healing Springs Resort in later years and now simply called The Cabins at Healing Springs.
  • “Many of the cabins are the original cabins that were built in the early 1900’s. … [While the cabins] may look rustic on the outside, they have sympathetically been remodeled each cabin to highlight the original historical features. … There is a range of cabin sizes to choose from.”
• NRHP nomination: “The discovery of the mineral waters in Ashe County, which tradition holds to have been in 1885 by Willie Barker, opened the way for Captain H.V. Thompson of Washington County, Virginia, to develop this into a widely advertised and highly popular resort.
  • “The mineral spring spas of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were not only centers for rejuvenating health, but were the most popular social centers. Thompson’s Bromine and Arsenic Springs is a good representative of a segment of our social heritage, of which only a few survive.”

204 N. Mendenhall Street, Greensboro
Double Oaks Bed & Breakfast
The Harden Thomas Martin House
MLS listing withdrawn March 28, 2022; relisted July 7, 2022
MLS listing withdrawn December 28, 2022
B&B listing withdrawn March 2023

• $1.65 million (originally $1.795 million)
• 6 bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, 6,700 square feet, 0.54 acre
• Price/square foot: $246
• Built in 1909
• Listed March 8, 2022
• Last sale: $625,000, June 2016
• Neighborhood: Westerwood
• Listing: “This is a turnkey business sale with all furnishings, fixtures and equipment included.”
• NRHP nomination: “The dominant exterior feature of the Martin residence is the broad front porch with Tuscan columns and a turned balustrade which carries across the full facade and the forward bays of each side elevation. The centerpiece of the porch — and of the entire house — is the bowed, two-story portico supported by four fluted Ionic columns with large terra cotta capitals. The portico shelters a bowed, second story balcony with a turned balustrade.”
  • “A handsome retaining wall of Mt. Airy granite, whose materials match those of the foundation, lines Mendenhall Street in front of the residence. An early photograph of the house does not show this wall, which was probably added during the 1920s when the grade of Mendenhall Street was lowered to meet the newly created Madison (now Friendly) Avenue to the south.”
  • “Completed in early 1909, the Harden Thomas Martin House is one of a handful of early Colonial Revival style residences surviving in the city of Greensboro.
  • “Designed by Greensboro architect G. Will Armfield, the house features a bowed, two-story, Ionic portico and an exceptionally generous center hall with a grand split-run stair. The house’s interior trim – including a handsome first-floor portal and eight mantels – remains completely intact.
  • “The house is the only known residential design of Armfield (1848-1927), a Guilford County native who pursued a successful career as a dry goods merchant before taking up architecture in his late 50’s.
  • “The house was built for Harden Thomas Martin (1857-1936) a native of Rockingham County who operated stores in the communities of Ayersville and Reidsville before moving to Greensboro in 1909, where he entered semi-retirement and engaged in small-scale real estate development.”
  • The NCSU Architects and Builders directory: “When North Carolina passed an architectural practice act and began the formal registration of architects, G. Will Armfield of Greensboro was granted certificate #1 on May 15, 1915. He was one of a large number of men who were certified based on having already been in practice prior to 1915. The Armfield Family Newsletter stated that his son Joseph joined him in architectural practice, and G. Will Armfield continued in that line of work as late as 1924.
  • “Armfield gained a number of substantial commissions, of which the best known is the large, classically inspired Alumni Hall (1914) at the Oak Ridge Institute in the village of Oak Ridge in Guilford County. He also undertook commercial and residential buildings in Greensboro. One of the few that have been identified as standing is the large, Southern Colonial-style residence Harden Thomas Martin House of 1909, built on Mendenhall Street in Greensboro as a retirement residence for Reidsville merchant Martin. The Manufacturers’ Record of July 23, 1908, noted that Armfield was building the house for Martin. Armfield’s blueprints for the house remained with the house and are now in the Special Collections Research Center at NCSU Libraries.”
• Note: County records shows the size of the house as 4,973 square feet, which may not reflect recent work that restored the third floor. They also show the date as 1910.

618 N. Main Street, Mount Airy, Surry County
The William Edward Merritt House
Heart & Soul Bed & Breakfast
listing withdrawn January 2, 2022; relisted June 24, 2022
sale pending August 21, 2022
no longer under contract October 15, 2022

• $899,900 (originally $850,000, later $750,000)
• 6 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms, 5,024 square feet (per county), 0.66 acre
• Price/square foot: $179
• Built in 1901
• Listed July 8, 2021
• Last sale: $152,000, April 2014
• Neighborhood: Mount Airy Historic District
• Note: The listing gives the square footage as 4,779.
  • The listing previously said there were 7 bedrooms and 7 1/2 bathrooms.
  • Listing: “The house is selling completely furnished except for personal belongings.” That includes a restored 1939 Cadillac Series 75 limousine (click for photo).
  • The property includes a detached two-car garage with an apartment above.
  • District NRHP nomination: “Large, impressive two-story brick late Victorian style house with granite trim, dominated by a two-and-one-half story polygonal projecting bay and one-story wrap-around porch with spindle frieze.
  • “The virtually unaltered house also features decorative, tall, corbelled and recessed panel interior chimneys, one-over-one windows with granite lintels and sills, granite string course extending around the house above the second story windows, decorative sawn brackets supporting wide overhanging eaves and Colonial Revival interior features.
  • “Built in 1901 by contractor J.A. Tesh for W.E. Merritt, who owned a hardware store and brickyard, and was the founder of the Renfro Textile Company and one of the founders of the Mount Airy Furniture Company.”
  • William Edward “Ed” Merritt (1867-1946) was born in Chatham, Virginia. His wife, Caroline Octavia “Carrie” Kochtitzky Merritt (1868-1960), was a native of Oakland, Missouri. After they came to Mount Airy, Ed’s parents and five of his six siblings also moved to the town.
  • From the Mount Airy News: “As is often the case, this new blood energized and benefited the community, as they established or led several major businesses: Merritt Hardware, Renfro Hosiery, Mount Airy Furniture Company, Merritt Machine Shop, Piedmont Manufacturing Company, and Floyd Pike Electrical, the North Carolina Granite Corp., and others. Several family members have served as town commissioners, the city engineer, the Surry County Draft Board, the county Board of Commissioners, and in the US Navy and Army.”

2314 Asbury Road, Asbury, Stokes County
The Smith Simmons House

• $599,900 (originally $659,900, later as low as $575,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2,918 square feet (per county), 1 acre
• Price/square foot: $206
• Built in 1891
• Listed April 11, 2022
• Last sale: $34,000, November 2016
• Note: The listing says it’s a wedding and event venue, but it’s website appears to be offline (info here).
  • The listing shows 4,492 square feet, a discrepancy of 54 percent.
  • The house has a Mount Airy mailing address, although it’s near the Asbury community in Stokes County, 12 miles northeast of Mount Airy.
  • Listing: “Some of the furnishings are also available for sale.”
  • The property includes a barn and a “pub,” originally the free-standing kitchen.

130 Main Street, Eden, Rockingham County

• $540,000
• 2 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 6,552 square feet, 1.1 acres
• Price/square foot: $82
• Built in 1948
• Listed January 30, 2023
• Last sale: April 2022, price not recorded on deed
• Neighborhood: Way over there in Draper
• Note: Originally Draper Methodist Church, later First Methodist Church of Draper, First United Methodist Church of Draper and finally First United Methodist Church of Eden
  • The church sold the property in November 2021 for $55,000.

419 S. Main Street, Kernersville, Forsyth County
The Stockton-Gibson House
The Gibson House Inn

• $529,000
• 5 bedrooms, 5 1/2 bathrooms, 4,442 square feet, 0.65 acre
• Price/square foot: $119
• Built in 1837
• Listed March 6, 2023
• Last sale: $238,000, February 2019
• Note: The property is next door to Korner’s Folly.
  • The inn’s website says the house was built by Doughty Stockton (1776-1855) and Elizabeth Perkins Stockton (1798-1858). Doughty, too, operated an inn. An obituary in The People’s Press said, “While his long useful and laborious life for the last forty-seven years was devoted to serving the public as a Landlord, with the noblest impulses and with a sensibility alive to the tenderest wishes of the weary traveller, his influence was ever exerted to render them comfortable and happy. He always discharged his duties with a dignity and propriety of conduct, which conciliated the regard and secured for him the love and esteem of all who knew him.”
  • The house apparently stayed in the Stockton family, with great-granddaughter Agnes C. Stockton Gibson (1877-1910) and her husband, Edward Hiram Gibson (1865-1926), taking ownership in the early 20th century. Their son, Edward Hiram Gibson III (1900-1973) sold the house in 1963. He was a history professor at Appalachian State University.
  • The house became an antiques store in the 1960s, then a mission church for Holy Cross Catholic Church from 1969-1982 and then an antiques store again. It became an inn again after the current owners bought it in 2019.

214 N. Main Street, Troy, Montgomery County
The Wade-Arscott House

• $369,000
• 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 3,474 square feet, 0.24 acre
• Price/square foot: $106
• Built in 1871
• Listing date unknown
• Last sale: $120,000, December 2016
• Neighborhood: Troy Residential Historic District (NR)
• Note: Now a well-reviewed B&B
  • One of five structures in the tiny Troy Residential Historic District
• District NR nomination: “A notable example of Queen Anne architecture in Troy is the two-and-a-half-story Wade-Arscott House, a rambling frame residence that is enlivened by widely spaced windows, a one-story wraparound porch supported by square posts and enclosed by plain balustrades, a cylindrical, weatherboarded and shingled tower capped by a helmet roof at the southwest corner of the structure, and a peaked gable dormer incorporating a recessed balcony.
  • “Two entrances afford access to the house: from Main Street, steps lead to a central bay containing a four-panel door framed by paneled sidelights and a three-section transom; on the south side, similar steps rise from the driveway to the porch where a glazed upper-panel door opens into a narrow stair hall.
  • “Windows contain two-over-two sash within simple frames, but the upper story of the tower is enlivened by small-paned curved sash containing colored glass inserts. A heavy cornice surrounds the house and the gabled roofs are covered with asphalt shingles. A large central chimney rises through the roof ridge, while a secondary flue marks the location of the kitchen in the rear wing.
  • “Inside, the house appears to have two separate construction dates. Marks in the floors and walls of the North section indicate that the two-story house originally contained two rooms, with four Greek Revival-style mantels, two-panel doors and a staircase in the Northeast corner of the North room.
  • “According to Richter’s Montgomery County Heritage, this portion was built in 1871 for Christopher Columbus Wade (1837-1915), Judge of Probate, and his wife, Sarah Margaret DeBerry (1845-1920).
  • “In the 1890s he enlarged the structure by removing the walls and stairs in the old section, and extending the house to the south with a wraparound porch, cylindrical tower, and a new entrance and staircase opening to the South porch.”
  • C.C. Wade (1837-1915) enlisted in the Confederate Army in 1861 at age 24, soon contracted bronchitis and was invalided out eight months later. He and Sarah were married in 1866. He became the county clerk of court in 1868, serving for 21 years. In 1904 he was elected state House; he declined to seek re-election, “preferring the quiet of his home and attention to his farming and business interests,” The Asheboro Courier related in a wonderfully laudatory obituary. The newspaper called him “an able, wise, prudent member, always carefully guarding the public good. Few members have served in the general assembly in our memory who ranked higher.
  • “His wisdom and sound judgment appealed to all, and his advice was often sought and always followed. His long experience and knowledge of men and public affairs peculiarly fitted him for the position.”
  • In 1930, 10 years after Sarah’s death, the house was sold by the administrator of C.C.’s estate for $8,015 in a public auction. The estate may have been a complicated one; parties to the sale included at least seven descendants, three other individuals and, perhaps reflecting diverse business interests on C.C.’s part, the American Exchange Bank of Greensboro, Stylebuilt Garments Company, Process Trim Hat Company, Flo Frocks Inc., and G.W. Allen & Son.
  • The property was purchased in 1946 by Lloyd Arscott (1901-1967), owner of a local office supply business, and his wife, Millie Blake (1906-1996). Their children sold the house 51 years later for $88,000.
  • After that, the house may have fallen on hard times. It was sold for $37,000 in 2003 and $21,000 in 2004. It apparently was restored before selling for $120,000 in 2016.