George Real Estate Group Radio Broadcast

From Hurricane Helene To Hope: Feeding Crews, Healing Community

• George Real Estate Group

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A hot meal handed off on the shoulder of a broken road can change the shape of a long day. We sit down with two neighbors from Batcave. Suzette Dupuis and Sherry Murphy turned Hurricane Helene’s devastation into a weekly lifeline, cooking and delivering trays of baked spaghetti, sandwiches, and soon chili to road crews, linemen, and families still digging out. Their story carries the weight of seven generations in the Middle Fork community, memories of the century-old flood, and the raw night when water climbed over the bridge and power stayed out for a month as helicopters ferried supplies to stranded hollows.

We walk through the nuts and bolts of grassroots relief: how an old antique store became a hub stacked with canned goods, meat, and paper products; why snack packs matter when convenience stores are hours away; and what it takes to keep volunteers moving week after week. Along the way, you’ll hear about the quiet leadership of local firefighters, the humility of neighbors who do the work without the spotlight, and the humor and faith that keep spirits up. “God is remodeling,” one of our guests jokes, reminding us that we can’t control the storm, but we can choose how we show up for each other.

We also share a clear-eyed real estate snapshot: Henderson County single-family home sales up year over year despite a brief post-storm pause, average prices easing from their peak, and what a recent Fed rate cut might mean for buyers and sellers. Markets are numbers; home is human. That’s why we sponsor the Hometown Hero series—to put names, faces, and needs at the center. If you’re ready to help, visit BatcaveDisasterRelief.com to volunteer or donate and add “Door Dasher” in the memo to fund meals that go straight to the crews and neighbors who need them. Subscribe, share this story with a friend, and leave a review to help more people find these local heroes.

SPEAKER_00:

The George Real Estate Group Radio broadcast is celebrating 10 years on WHKP. The George Real Estate Group is celebrating 10 years on the radio live every Thursday morning at 10.05 on WHKP 107.7 FM and AM 1450, and streaming online at WHKP.com. Each Friday morning at 845, the George Real Estate Group presents the Hometown Hero Award to someone in our community who goes above and beyond to make our hometown a better place to live. Here's this week's Hometown Hero Show. It's 845, and we always gather on uh Friday mornings at 845 for the George Real Estate Group Hometown Hero series. And it is always a pleasure to welcome Noah. George, Noah always comes to join us when he's uh free, and that's just about every Friday we get together, Noah.

SPEAKER_01:

Most fry most Fridays I'm here, but it's a I mean highlight of the week and grateful to miss it, do you? I do not. I mean, it's amazing. And you and I have had the privilege of having the conversation with so many uh amazing uh people in our community that serve our community, and uh it's it's always refreshing, it's always uh incredible, and and I know uh you and I love love having these interviews.

SPEAKER_00:

We love doing it and uh taking a little bit more of a hands-on approach uh towards it uh in the last year or so. And that's right. And we uh we've met uh so many people we've been of course uh concentrating for the past year on uh the devastation and uh the Broad River Gorge and and uh the Hurricane Helene and and that just doesn't seem to stop the uh the uh ongoing recovery down there. So that's kind of what we've been focusing on. But uh I wanted to ask you about the real estate business.

SPEAKER_01:

We'll give a quick quick update. It's so interesting, and you bring uh bring up a great point. Again, it's our community, so many areas are still in recovery and still you know working through things and and restoring things and rebuilding. The fascinating thing is you know, we had a slight pause, as you can imagine, because of the hurricane. But the last 12 months, even with the pause, we've actually had eight percent more single family homes sold in Henderson County than the previous 12 months, which is so so to put things into context, uh you know, we were at 125 single-family homes a month on average. Now we're at 132 single-family homes a month on average. I mean, there was 121 more homes sold in the in those comparing those two time frames. Yeah. We've had a slight decline in prices. Our prices are down about three percent. But I mean, that was from the high of an average price of 550, and now we're in the five thirties. I mean, so again, it it's softening a little bit. But when you think that there's been more homes sold, and that's in the environment of the interest rates. By the way, the feds lowered the interest rates this week.

SPEAKER_00:

Another quarter point.

SPEAKER_01:

Quarter point, and again, that's gonna impact. It's not the same as mortgage rates, but but that does have an impact uh on all of it. And so, you know, the market where we live, again, it's a very stable market, very consistent. You know, the demand is you know, life happens, therefore real estate happens, regardless of the interest rates, regardless. I mean, you know, even in the light of the the the storm that we had, again, life kept going on, real estate keeps going on, and and that this is my 20th year helping our serving our community and with my broker's license, and and we have an incredible team in place, and we love serving our community through real estate, so we're glad to help any way we can. Get us in touch. Absolutely. Call us directly at 828-393-0134. Follow us on social media. We have a number of open houses this weekend. Oh, yeah. You can see that on our on our social media. Uh, we also podcast our our radio shows. We're here every Thursday morning at 10 a.m. Actually, been doing that radio program since 2011. Uh, you know, so been doing that consistently every Thursday, and then grateful to sponsor the Hometown Hero Series. Find us online at realastate by Greg.com, but but grateful to sponsor the Hometown Hero Series.

SPEAKER_00:

Suzette Dupree and Sherry Murphy, the Batcave Dashers. Good morning, ladies. Good morning. How are y'all?

SPEAKER_02:

Fantastic. Doing great.

SPEAKER_00:

Scoot up to that mic just a little bit, Suzette. Uh gosh, y'all are uh okay, we'll get it right out front. You you prepare, you help prepare with other volunteers a meal uh most every day at the Batcave Recover Relief Center. Correct. And uh then you uh distribute that to the Batcave workers. Sherry, tell us a little bit more.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, we cook it and we we go and get boxes and we put so many books meals in a box, and then when we come up to the crews we ask 'em, how many do you have? So they tell us and we just put the box, hand the box to them, say, have a blessed day.

SPEAKER_00:

And you bring a little sunshine with that free meal, don't you? So is that how uh how long you y'all started doing this right after the storm, I guess, right?

SPEAKER_02:

Um We've been doing the um feeding the road crews for a couple months now, but we've been feeding the volunteers since pretty much the beginning. Yeah. And we feed the um road workers on Wednesdays.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, okay, okay. And uh what kind of meals do you cook? We cook everything up.

SPEAKER_02:

Baked spaghetti, sandwiches. We're gonna be doing chili pretty soon because the weather's getting cooler. Yeah. We also put snack packs in there that have three or four different snacks. So during the day they can go and have a little snack because up in Batcave you can't just run to the convenience store.

SPEAKER_01:

And road crew, I mean, these in the the uh electrical, the power workers, I mean, or they were I mean, from everywhere coming through and yes, we feed everybody, even if you're working on someone's house and we see you, we stop, we offer you lunch.

SPEAKER_02:

If you're a community member and we see you out working in your yard, we stop and we offer you lunch. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_01:

Let's back up. You both are in the community. I mean, let's talk about your own experience with Helene and then the catalyst for deciding to do what you're doing right now.

SPEAKER_02:

There's just so much destruction, and it really brought all of us really close together. We come from a com uh incredible community. Um, our fire departments, our back cave disaster relief, I mean, everybody just helped each other, and it hasn't stopped, and I don't see it stopping anytime in the near future.

SPEAKER_01:

And I don't think that's I mean, the here we are on Four Seasons Boulevard, and it's and life is happening, but I mean I I don't think people understand the gravity of the recovery efforts.

SPEAKER_02:

No, and if you saw pictures on the internet, they don't do it justice. To be there and see it, it's ongoing, our roads are still crumbling, our bridges are still deteriorating, we still have mudslides, it's everyday something.

SPEAKER_01:

It's still ground zero there.

SPEAKER_02:

That's correct.

SPEAKER_03:

It is ground zero.

SPEAKER_02:

Were your personal homes okay? Mine was, Sherry's was not.

SPEAKER_03:

I had water damage.

SPEAKER_02:

Were you there when it happened?

SPEAKER_03:

I watched the whole thing at nighttime. I was praying to the good Lord just to hold me, hold everybody on that mountain. I could see the winds putting the trees in the circles. I said there's a tornado somewhere. And then I watched the water because I was always told by my dad, if the water goes above the bridge, go to higher ground. So I was up until three o'clock in the morning watching the water, and I finally said, Lord, I leave it in your hands and just if I go tonight, it'll be because you need me. And then I got up the next morning and I watched all the water jumped the bridge, the state bridge, because the bridge was clogged up with debris and it had gotten into my garden and washed it and washed across the road, and then I was worried about my cousin that lived next door and I thought, oh gosh, please Lord have protected him. Because I thought maybe the bank was coming down on him and it worried me.

unknown:

Of course.

SPEAKER_03:

So I got up and I said, I'm gonna go try to walk and see who make sure he's okay. And he was, but his chicken coop, God bless him, went into the creek and he lost his chickens and his chicken coop.

SPEAKER_01:

But your family's been there for generations.

SPEAKER_03:

For generations. I'm the seventh generation.

SPEAKER_01:

And and this is Middle Fork community.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01:

We've had others from Middle Fork and in the Batcave area that you talk about the the the flood from a hundred years ago. And your father or grandparents probably experienced that.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, they did. I had a grand aunt that experienced that, and that's when they had no equipment, and they had they told me they said the bodies that they found they prepared them and there, washed them and buried them as soon as possible. And the cows and all the livestock that passed, they burned. And she said she told me she said we had to dig by shovels, picks, axes, try to find as many as we could. And they had no way of getting except by through the mills to find these people, and we still lost a family of five that we never did, but they never did find.

SPEAKER_00:

So your family's been through this on middle four that bridge okay, uh fast forward through the storm, you you're now stranded, right?

SPEAKER_03:

I'm stranded, yes. No way to get out.

SPEAKER_02:

We all were for probably six to eight weeks before we could get off, and we had no power for over a month, um, no communication. It was it was wild.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. No way to get out and get groceries, right? No.

SPEAKER_02:

No, but they brought it in by helicopter, and we have a volunteer fireman, Isaac Guppy, that lives up near us. We've had Isaac here, yes. And he took he took it. He took charge. He took charge and he got us through it. I don't think we'd be where we are without him.

SPEAKER_01:

I Isaac and his wife were here. It was an incredible story. There is Jessica.

SPEAKER_02:

That whole family, Ashley and Isaac, wonderful, wonderful children.

SPEAKER_01:

Incredible.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Yeah, they were here, and uh, I don't think they told uh everything. I mean, they were very humble.

SPEAKER_03:

They're humble, yes. They are.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. That's what we found is uh a uh a great sense of humility about serving your fellow man and helping out in a storm situation.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, neighbors showing up. I mean, again, it brought I mean as awful as it was, the the what how it brought the community together, people showing up, neighbors helping neighbors. I mean, just and again, it's so encouraging to hear these stories. Again, I know you live through it, and and again, there's so much to process, but and then for you guys now, again, you were you were you couldn't get out for six to eight weeks, and then and then again getting involved like you do with the the serving the community through meals, I mean it's in it's it's powerful.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, a lot of those guys they're separated from their families. We've met people from California, from Texas, from Florida, that are up here working for the road, and they've left their family, they have no one. So if we can once a week bring them a smile and a hot meal, that's what we do.

SPEAKER_03:

If we can lift our spirits, that's what we want.

SPEAKER_02:

Tell us where you're based out of and where you're making the meals and at Batcave disaster relief, it's where the Batcave post office is. Um there used to be an antique store, Hip Hip Pen, and that was owned by Lynn and Mark. And so they've turned that into the hub. And they have food there, they have canned goods, they have paper products, they have meat. Um, if anybody needs any help with fixing things, they can contact them and they'll do everything in their power to help them.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, we've had them here too, and uh uh the just an amazing group of people that you live amongst. It really is.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, I've been up there for 23 years, and I had never met Sherry. We'd wave. Right. But then when the hurricane happened, now we're partners in crime. Crime. Pretty much.

SPEAKER_00:

I I would say there's a lot of laughter and uh and smiles and oh yeah. Yeah. I mean we have a good time, right? You have to.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, you have to. I mean now it's recovery time to and try to lift as many spirits. When you look at it, the devastation's so bad. And a lot of people it gets them down and nah, you gotta look at it in this terms. God is remodeling.

SPEAKER_02:

Exactly. There you go.

SPEAKER_01:

You're changing I mean you sh you we get to decide what things mean. We can't control what happens to us, right? You you get to decide how to respond to it, how to show up. And you guys have showed up for the community, and and I love your your sense of humor, and I love again your attitude on it. Again, we can't control what happens to us, but we get to decide how we respond to it. We saw people living in tents.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow, wow, people with no running water in their homes. And you know, of course, thing other things have happened around the world, but I just hope people don't forget us because we still have a long way to go.

SPEAKER_01:

Are are you guys still is there still an opportunity for volunteers?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes. Yes, you can go to BatcaveDisasterrelief.com and they have volunteers, and anybody that wants to donate can donate there also. And if they'd like to donate to the Batcave Door Dashers, they can just put in the map memo Door Dasher. Yeah, because it takes groceries to about$250 a week to feed those people. Wow. Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

So you could use help out Batcave Disaster Relief.com.com. All right. Uh well we uh want to try to help in any way we can. We're gonna talk uh with you after we get off the air about some other people. There's there's so many.

SPEAKER_02:

There's so many. It's it's an incredible community. I mean everyone. It's just amazing.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, we come so too. We we think uh y'all are very much a part of that. And thank you. And we want to thank you for coming up uh to visit with us this morning and tell us about the Batcave DoorDashers. Uh again, the contact information, Batcave Relief.

SPEAKER_02:

Batcave Disaster Relief.com.

SPEAKER_00:

All right, and that gets you to where you need to go to give. All right.

SPEAKER_02:

You can sign up to be a volunteer or you can donate.

SPEAKER_00:

Uh we've got a small token of our appreciation, a little certificate and some certificates for uh for y'all to enjoy a free meeting. Thank you. Oh thank you so much. Thank you so much. Noah, uh, we've got about uh 30 seconds left for you to uh remind us of open houses and things going on this weekend at the George Real Estate Group. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01:

Follow us on our social media, you'll see about all our open houses, and of course you can find us online at realestate by greg.com. You can call us directly at 828-393-0134. We're grateful to serve the community through real estate, and we're so grateful to sponsor the Hometown Hero series.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, uh, we thank you for that. We really, really do. And invite you to join us again here next Friday morning at 8 45 when we salute yet another George Real Estate Group Hometown Hero. And uh we hope you have a wonderful Halloween. Uh sample that candy that the kids bring home. You know, some you gotta check it to make sure it's right. It's the dad tax. See you next week.

SPEAKER_01:

You've built a lifetime of strength, wisdom, and independence. And here's the best part you still have it. Every decision, every step, every next chapter is yours to choose. Selling your home isn't about letting go, it's about opening the door to more freedom, more time for what you love, more energy for the people and passions that matter most. At the George Real Estate Group, we believe independence isn't behind you. It's right here, right now. Our team goes beyond buying and selling. We're here to help you protect your wealth, preserve your legacy, and make sure Uncle Sam doesn't become your biggest benefactor. We'll guide you every step of the way towards your next chapter, your next opportunity, and your freedom on your terms. Call us at 828-393-0134. Find us online at realestatebygreg.com.

SPEAKER_00:

The George Real Estate Group is located in Flat Rock, North Carolina, near Hendersonville in Henderson County. You can find them online at realestatebygreg.com. The George Real Estate Group can be reached at 828-3930134 or stop by their office at 2720 Greenville Highway, Flat Rock, North Carolina. Tune in live each week on Thursdays at 1005 AM on WHKP 107.7 FM and 1450 AM, or stream online at WHKP.com, or download these podcasts wherever you get your podcasts. The George Real Estate Group brings you the WHKP Hometown Hero Series every Friday morning at 845.