Liz’s Notebook: Bluffton home featured in New York Times

Whenever Bluffton, Hilton Head Island or Beaufort pop up on the national news radar, it’s exciting. First, the mention is usually positive (in other words, this isn’t “Florida man commits dumb crime that involves a fast food restaurant, marine life or bath salts” attention). Second, it often validates our decisions to have moved here or to have stayed here.

Over the past year, we’ve seen the area mentioned several times for its “travel-to-this-place” qualities — most recently Beaufort was featured in Vogue.

This week, Bluffton has made the news for its real estate.

A home at 93 Cumberland Drive in Belfair Plantation will be featured Sunday in The New York Times’ weekly “What You Get” series, which was posted online March 16.

The feature is titled “$1,190,000 Homes in New Mexico, Louisiana and South Carolina,” even though the home in Bluffton is listed at $1,149,500, but what’s $40,500 among friends?

The home is listed with The Saltmarsh Team with Keller Williams, Tom Watson and Kim France. I spoke with Watson on Thursday morning to find out if his phone has been ringing off the hook.

Not yet.

But he and France are hopeful the story will attract some interest Sunday.

“We expect a lot of calls,” he said.

Here’s how they ended up in The New York Times:

The listing caught the attention of “What You Get” writer Mike Powell, who stumbled upon the home’s website three weeks ago, Watson said. From there, Powell reached out to Keller Williams.

After a two-hour phone interview with Powell and a five-hour photo session with a photographer sent by the Times, well ... here we are.

This story was originally published March 17, 2016 at 3:31 PM with the headline "Liz’s Notebook: Bluffton home featured in New York Times."