S2 E25: It’s a Small World After All: Military Moves, Smart Real Estate Decisions & a $85K Win

Ever feel like the military world is both massive… and incredibly small at the same time? 🌎✨ In this episode of the Closing Chapters Podcast, Brittney shares a powerful “small world” story that ties together military life, real estate, and the ripple effects of smart decisions.

We’re diving into a 2019 home purchase in Sumter, SC—where timing, strategy, and the right fit created not just a dream lifestyle for a military family, but also a major financial win just a few years later.

If you're navigating PCS moves, considering buying (or selling), or trying to make confident real estate decisions during uncertain transitions—this episode will give you perspective, clarity, and encouragement.

Key Takeaways 🎯

• The military community is smaller than you think—connections matter.
• The right home isn’t just about price—it’s about lifestyle fit.
• PCS transitions require fast, strategic decision-making.
• Not every “dream duty station” is the right fit for every family.
• Real estate appreciation can be steady—and sometimes explosive.
• Proximity to base vs. space and lifestyle is a personal decision.
• Hearing real experiences (not just social media highlights) matters.

Closing Chapters Podcast: Where Every Mission Has A Story

Thanks for listening. We talk all things military real estate, my transactions, the mistakes, the wins, and simple plays you can use right now.

Work With Me:

• Buying or selling near Fort Bragg & Moore County
• Agents, partner with me 

Connect With Brittney:

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📧 Email: brittney@homeswithbrittney.com

If this episode helped, follow the show, leave a quick review, and share it with a friend in PCS season.

Disclaimer: This podcast education only & is not legal, tax, or financial advice. Talk with your own pros about your situation. Opinions are my own.

© 2025 Brittney Frye. All rights reserved. Realtor, license # 352197 in NC. Brokerage: REAL Broker l Military Division

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hey my friend, welcome back to the closing chapters podcast where every mission has a story. This property was in Sumter, South Carolina. If you're curious where I'm at now, Aberdeen, North Carolina. So cool, full circle that like my career started in Sumter, South Carolina, and now we are literally just over two hours away in Aberdeen, North Carolina. And I actually used to come to this area growing up. So it's like such a small world. Hey, hey friends. We are taking it back to July of 2019 again. We are almost at the end of July 2019. And oh by the way, I was already in South Dakota before this closing. We left July 15th, I think. We were gone from July 15th to December 10th in South Dakota for our last military stint in the Air Force, like our last move for the Air Force. And that is when my husband jumped ship to the army, and our life got crazy, and all of the moves ensued. So this property was in Sumter, South Carolina. If you're curious where I'm at now, Aberdeen, North Carolina. So cool, full circle that like my career started in Sumter, South Carolina, and now we are literally just over two hours away in Aberdeen, North Carolina. And I actually used to come to this area growing up. So it's like such a small world. This whole day is just small world talk. Yeah, I used to go to this area called the Maxton Lorenberg Airport, and we would do land speed racing there. And if you don't know what that is, it's like drag racing, but one vehicle at a time. They have different classifications. It could be motorcycles, cars, trucks. We even had the go-kart that, like, literally was like a metal box that sat on the ground and had these tiny wheels. You had to start it with a jumper box and then disconnect it. Like super cool. But, anyways, really neat experience. And we used to watch the Golden Knights do a lot of their training out there. So it's really neat. And now my husband's building, it looks at the Golden Knights building on the base, which is pretty darn cool. So that is our current small world circle conversation. Now the next one is all about this house that we're gonna talk about, right? So I got to sell this really cool house in July of 2019 to this awesome family that when I say busy, competitive dance daughter, a busy son, they need space. And by the way, dad is taking command as a lieutenant colonel here at Charles Air Force Base. Okay. So their world has a lot going on. And on top of it, they were coming from Hawaii. So I met them coming back from island life. We had very little to no time to make a plan and get them situated, and we were able to do it. And they landed on an awesome house. It was in a really neat neighborhood called Beach Creek, which is backed up to a golf course. And what's neat about this is one, there's decent sized lots, right? So this one in particular was about three-quarters of an acre, and it's woodlined in the back. So front is a nice yard, but the back of it is woods. There wasn't a decent yard to play into, but you had privacy because there's this woodline buffer around everything. And this one was like set up for boy life for sure. There was a tree house, there was a zip line. Trying to keep dad off of those things while we were looking at the house was just as hard. It doesn't matter how old they get, they're just big kids, especially when they're in the military. So, anyhow, really neat property. This sucker, 4,000 square feet, five bedrooms, three full baths, and it's an Albrick house. Okay. So what that means is all brick is usually more expensive. They bought this house for $305,000 in 2019. Now, I want to break this down for you a little bit. When it was originally built, this house it was built in 2013. Okay. So in 2013, it sold for $260,000. $260,000. All right. And then in 2017, it sold for $285,000. Okay. So $25,000 in four years. That's pretty reasonable, right? So then we went from 2017 to 2019 and it sold for $305,000. Okay. So they went from 2019 to 2022 and went from $305,000 to they sold it for $390,000. And of course, I got to help them sell it. So we'll talk about that transaction in the future. But just to show, like the deal of the century that they got was amazing. It was a very steady incremental appreciation on the property. And then we had our little COVID bubble, right? And they got out when the getting out was good. So, anyhow, this property served them very well. And I wanted to tell you a little bit more about their scenario. Like I said, they were coming from island life. So for them, this $305,000 was like a sweet deal. They were coming from a world where everything was really expensive. It was super hard to travel around, and they really just felt stuck. And this is one of those families that it's really cool when you get some insight to be able to make future decisions. This is one of a few families that when they came back from Hawaii to stateside, they were like, yeah, it could have been a really cool experience, but I would not want to do it again. So that kind of shaped and confirmed our world whenever we had to make decisions. Because when James hopped over to Army Life, we actually had orders to Hawaii. That was our first set of orders. Actually, I'll take that back. We were supposed to go to JBLM, which is Joint Base Lewis McCord in Washington State. And we those orders got shifted around because there was a family that had an EFMP status, and that base fulfilled that purpose. So they knocked us off the peg and then gave us orders to Hawaii. And I had had these experiences, and honestly, this is pretty recent. So we're talking a year later. So this was happening in June of 2020, June to September of 2020, that we were getting these orders to Hawaii. And I was like, I don't know that that's the life we want. Like, one, we had a newborn, and two, we knew it was really expensive. And three, we had gone through all of these transitions so quickly. We didn't want to take on expensive life. And then could I do real estate in Hawaii for just a few years? We knew the rules with housing and land are very different in Hawaii. And we just decided that that probably wasn't best for us. Well, we love to go visit Hawaii and experience the life there. Yes, absolutely. But we did not want to be stationed there. And I'm so thankful that there are other families like this family that are willing to just be open and honest. Because when you see it through rose-colored glasses, aka social media, everybody's living on the beach and living the dream, and the communities are all together and housing, and you think, okay, this is cool. But then you hear the reality is yeah, there's all of these branches of military all smushed together. And it's almost like each kid goes to school and comes home with the my dad is this, what is your dad? And it's like all this competitive rivalry amongst all these military branches, which is really funny that kids carry the identity of their parents and eye-opening as well. But honestly, we just were not up for that financial challenge. And we were worried about that with Washington as it was. So we were like, okay, if we were worried about Washington, how in the world can we not be worried about Hawaii? Because Hawaii is more expensive than Washington. And even just for the cost of goods, right? Not even housing, but the cost of goods. So that was a bit of a concern. But anyhow, I I'm very thankful that they helped shape that perspective for us. But I really loved the fact that I got to help them come back to serenity. And what I mean by serenity is they had space, they had peace and quiet, they had ease of access to everything. Everybody has a different opinion of like how far out they want to be to the installation. And especially if you are taking on command, you need to be pretty close and accessible. And when I told them, like, yeah, you're like 15-ish minutes from the base, they were like, oh my gosh, that's amazing. And what's really cool is, yeah, they are like a straight shot, but they're off of some back roads. So depending on which way they go, they're not just like a hop, jump, and a skip to the base. And what I mean by that is like when we lived there, we literally lived across the light that went to the gate. So my husband can make it to work faster than a lot of the guys that actually lived on the installation. So there's people like that that really just wanna be like there. And then there's people that just want a little bit of space. Also, like I said, we had a dancing queen, right? Their daughter was a competitive dancer. So being off of the main road that was gonna boogie to Columbia or hook over to Highway 20 and let them go where they needed to go was a huge proponent for this location. And there's a golf course. And little man and dad played golf together all the time. So it was really cool to be able to give them this lifestyle that they were going to enjoy and this house that served their needs and had the space and capacity for what they wanted to do. And oh, by the way, we might have family that is in queue with us. So we had a lot of conversations about that. There was this really cool flex room downstairs that we were like, okay, could this be considered a bedroom? Like, we were talking about family members with mobility limitations. So trying to see like how it could serve all of the purposes. And I absolutely love that I was able to do this for them and support them with this, and that they loved this house so much that they passed it on to somebody else. Really cool. You're gonna have to hang around a while to hear about that because that's a couple years down the road. But it's just it's pretty awesome. This is one of the only situations where this has occurred. Now, small world story. Small world. I just texted my husband because I was looking at the like property report to say, hey, how would it sell for the first time that it sold? So we talked about that, right? It sold for $260,000 to one of the NCOs in my husband's office when he was stationed at Shaw Air Force Base. I don't know how I did not recognize that or pay attention, or we hadn't had that conversation when I originally sold this house, and I've sold it twice. So I just texted him and said, Hey, how cool is this? I sold so-and-so's house twice. And how do we not know? So, yes, we want to talk about small world. We knew who lived in it prior from 2013 to 2017. We don't know the people, obviously, from 2017 to 19, but then now I know the people from 2019 to the current owners. So it's really interesting when you get to see like the history of a home, especially when like there's some sort of attachment there. And we talk a lot about how in the military there's like usually only two degrees of separation. Like, you probably know people that are connected. If you go through two different people or talk to somebody about somebody, there's a good chance that they might know that somebody, and then now you are now connected with that person in between. And this is a perfect example of that. The military is such a large world, such a large world, yet it is so small, and that is such a cool and exciting thing to discover. So that is my big world, small world story of the day. And I can't wait to tell you about this house. Fast forward to 2022. But in the meantime, this family lived in it, they loved it, they grew in it, they had their kids play their little hearts out and have space again, and just got to breathe. And that is worth a million bucks. So I hope you have a wonderful day, and I am looking forward to talking to you again very soon. Hey! I just wanted to say thank you for being here and listening in on this episode of Closing Chapters with me. I truly enjoy putting this content together, and I hope that you enjoy it too. If so, could you like, subscribe, and share this episode with somebody you know that will enjoy it just as much as you did? Thank you so much.